Speeding Cars
by RJ Lewis the II
Summary: Reid was the idiot that thought he was invincible. She was the one who proved him wrong. DISCONTINUED.
1. Heres the day you hoped would never come

**Dudes, I am on a roll. This is technically my third Covenant story, but only the first on this account. For those who remember me (it was a rather long time ago..) I used to be known as roryirene. If you do remember me, which I highly doubt, Headlights and Boulders both have been deleted, along with the rest of my writings on that account. Have no fear, I'll keep writing, but I got bored with my old ideas.**

**Now, onward. This takes place the summer before the movie. For future reference, Tyler is a _year younger_ than the rest of the guys. In my defense, that's what the offical site told me. Ha. Beat the evidence, why don't you.**

**I own nothing, just Carter and Lola and any other people you don't know from the movie.**

**Chapter One**

"_That's just the way things go. We meet people, get to know them and then they get up and leave us behind."_

An alarm sounded as a digital clock red eight thirty in bright neon green. A hand reached out from beneath a light brown comforter as the girl sleeping under it fumbled to silence the blaring alarm. It took a few random hits of her hand to finally shut the alarm off completely, leaving the small pale yellow room in silence. The sleeping form of the teenage girl lay still before she jumped abruptly out of bed, flying into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her loudly.

The sounds of an old shower filled the silent house and it was quickly replaced by a hair dryer screaming loudly. Seconds later, _Just Impolite_ by Plushgun rang out from the bathroom, drowning out the dryer easily. A cat climbed in through in the open window letting out a whiny meow, scratching at the white door leading into the bathroom. She called out pitifully a few more times before abandoning the door and leaped on to the deserted bed, making herself at home in no time.

Five minutes later, Carter Murphy stumbled out of her bathroom, toothbrush jammed in her mouth as she jumped on one foot, attempting to put on a striped sock. Her long, brown hair was tied up with a shoe lace messily, almost more hair was out of the lace than in it. She pulled on a pair of worn straight leg jeans that had holes in the knees, courtesy of years of being worn. A blue polo shirt went on over her Daphne Loves Derby shirt and Carter grabbed a pair of orange converse as she dashed from her room, calling goodbye to C.A.T, her lazy and slightly overweight tabby cat. A faint meow followed Carter down the hall in a stalled reply.

She didn't bother running down the entire steps, jumping off the side of the stairs where the banister had broken off years before.

"I'm leaving!" Carter called, grabbing a muffin from a basket on the kitchen counter and her keys from off the center table. She waited for a response from her father and let out a sigh when none came. Quickly, Carter walked into the den, unsurprised to find a passed out man occupying her couch, beer bottle in hand, dangling off the side. With a sigh, Carter grabbed the bottle and covered her dad with a blanket. She threw the bottle away in the trash and unhooked her plaid bag from a peg near the back door.

Climbing into her 1969 yellow and black Mustang, a birthday present from her Uncle Otto a year ago, Carter smiled at the revving engine.

_Sounds of heaven._

With a grin, she pulled expertly out of her small drive-way, heading towards town. Flipping on the radio, she glanced at the clock and cursed at the time. Her speed picked up, the Massachusetts scenery flying by her window. It was the end of summer and only a few trees had started turning colors. When everything finally fell into fall, Carter would be out in the woods, taking pictures of everything. Fall was the prettiest of seasons, except for winter, but only because of the snow.

Her car bounced as it rolled into the back parking of Denny's. She climbed out of her car, making sure to lock the door behind her. She sprinted across the parking lot, which was still wet from the night's rain, and threw open the door that had 'Employee's Only' scrawled across it in red paint. Tossing her bag into a random corner, Carter dashed through the back hall and into the front where the clocking-in machine sat, waiting for her.

She punched her card and grinned, seeing that she was still a few minutes early.

"Cutting it a bit close there, kid" a voice stated behind her and Carter laughed at her friend's tired face.

"Overslept again," Carter said, walking back to where she had flung her bag. Lola followed behind her, pulling out a packet of gum from her apron. She offered one to Carter and put them away when she declined.

"Bad night's sleep again?"

Carter nodded her head, pulling her own apron out of her bag and turned back to Lola. "Lot on my mind, you know?"

The red head let out a laugh, grabbing Carter by the arm and pulled her towards the kitchens. "Don't blame you. If I were you," she said, pushing open the swinging double doors easily, "I would be in the Bahamas by now. Or at least Hawaii."

"Do I look like a 'beach babe' to you?" Carter inquired, gesturing to her shoe-laced hair and torn jeans. Lola stopped and looked her over, pretending to judge her. She twirled her index finger and frowned when her friend failed to amuse her. Carter gave her a smile and filled her apron pockets with a few pens and a order pad.

"Beach babe?" Lola said, following her friend, watching her walk like a pageant judge. "No. Beach Bum?" Carter took that moment to let out a loud burp, blushing slightly at her friend's upraised eyebrow. "Totally."

A ding could be heard out front. Carter threw her friend a dirty look as she walked through another set of swinging doors. "I resent that!" she called back, turning back to the counter.

After giving the customer a cup of black coffee to go, Carter walked back through the doors. "I don't think I'm feeling the love right now, Lo," she announced, leaning against a stove and staring at her friend who was eating a piece of cheese.

Lola shrugged, swallowing the last of her cheese. "You asked," she said truthfully, a smile playing on the corner of her glossed lips, "I simply answered. Think of it this way," she continued, "I could've lied to you." The look of complete seriousness on her friend's face made Carter burst out laughing. Lola watched her with a smile of her own and walked into the diner when the bell dinged again.

"People wonder why I have crappy self esteem," Carter mumbled with a smile.

She rubbed her ribs as a throb of pain vibrated through her abdomen. With a sigh Carter grabbed a bottle of pills out of her bag, counting out three and popping them into her mouth. She didn't bother with water as the bell dinged out in the diner. Rubbing her side again, Carter let out a deep breath and plastered a smile to her face before walking out into the diner.

The next few hours were filled with the morning rush that had somehow flowed seamlessly into the lunch rush. Two of the other waitresses had relieved both Carter and Lola for their lunch hour. They placed orders with Cookie, who was, ironically, the cook.

"I hate people," Carter stated with a sigh as she and Lola sat down at a back booth, their food in hand.

Lola gave her an amused look. "You love people, Murph."

Carter shook her head, stuffing a fry into her mouth that was slathered with gravy. "Not today. People are stupid today."

A disgusted looked graced Lola's round face as she watched Carter continue eating her gravy fries. "People are stupid every day."

Carter shrugged, not arguing with the valid point. "Well, they're stupider than normal today."

"This coming from the girl eating gravy and _fries_," Lola started, daintily digging into her salad. Carter grinning at her, making sure to make a show of eating the last of her delicious gravy fries. "You work any more on the list?"

Picking up her hamburger, Carter shook her head slowly. "Don't know what else I'm going to put on it," she took a bite of her burger and swallowed it, looking at Lola in slight confusion. "I mean, what the hell am I supposed to write?"

"You need to finish it," Lola said in a quiet voice, nudging her lettuce leaves around rather than eating them. Carter scoffed, taking another bite of her burger. "I'm serious, Murph," Lola pressed, ceasing to play with her food, "You're going to regret it if you don't."

"What's the point of it anyways, Lo? It's not exactly like I have time to do any of it anyways."

Lola gave Carter a hard stare, pointing her fork at her threatening. "Don't you dare say that, Carter Jane Murphy. Don't you dare." Her blue eyes held tears in them, though none overcame their boundaries. Her face held a seriousness that only came when the two friends discussed the list, or _it._

Carter softened, seeing Lola trying to with hold her tears. She reached a hand across the table, grabbing her friend's hand with hers. "You know it's going to happen, Lo," she said softly, her voice comforting. "You know what the doctors said. A year, at most."

Lo pulled her hand away and looked at Carter fiercely. "You're not going to die, Carter. I'm not going to let you." Her face turned excited and she leaned forward in her seat. "I've got it all planned out. Don't worry about a thing. We're gonna get you the money, Murph. I promise."

She knew Lola meant well and Carter wanted to believe with all her heart that she could fix everything. But she couldn't. There wasn't anything that she or anyone else could do about it. Lola didn't know, but the cancer had spread into her bones. The doctors had told her that ever if she could afford the operation, it would only buy her a year, maybe only months more. Carter had meant to tell Lola, she knew she deserved to know. But, as Carter looked at Lola, and th e look of hope and determination that was on her eager face, Carter didn't have the heart to tell her.

Lola reached out and took back Carter's hand and smiled at her. "I'm gonna fix this, I promise."

Another waitress, Bertie, called out for Lola and Carter didn't have a chance to respond before her friend picked up her plate and glass, leaving to help with some customers. Carter let out a groan and let her head fall to the table with a thud. She banged it against the hard surface a few times before letting it rest.

She reached into her apron pocket, not lifting her head from the table until a loose order ticket was in her grasp. Carter leaned back in the booth, staring at the ticket with a frown. 'The Bucket List' was written across it in pen and only a few slots had been filled out, with the help of Lola.

Number ten was taken by _Learn to Ice Skate_ and _Go to Boston _had taken up residence on number three. Ice skating had been Lola's idea, and Carter had always wanted to go Boston. She fount it annoying that despite living in the same state as the city, she'd never been.

The other eight spaces on the ticket were left empty, waiting for Carter to fill them in. She wanted nothing more than to scribble to entire sheet out before lighting it on fire, but knew that Lola would simply make her write another.

It was ironic how Lola was determined not to let her die, but insisted on Carter making a list of all the things she wanted to do before she did. How in three stooges did that make _any_ sense?

With another low groan, Carter let her head fall back onto the table, not caring that it was starting to hurt.

"That kills brain cells," a voice told her from above. Carter could tell it was a guy, or a very ugly sounded woman. She didn't bother to open her eyes. She was on break and if the guy wanted something to eat, he could talk to Lola.

"So does country music," her response came out muffled but the guy seemed to hear her anyways, seeing as he laughed lightly.

"Hell yes, it does."

Carter felt the table shift and looked up blearily to see a blond guy, maybe a year older than her, sitting across from her. His blue eyes pierced hers and a smirk was sitting lightly on his lips. He wore a black short sleeved shirt, and jeans, from what Carter could tell. To finish off what she could only guess was his 'bad-ass' attire, the boy had black leather fingerless gloves on.

_Typical._

"What're you doing?"

The guy gave her a smirk and almost amused look as he sifted through a menu that had somehow found it's way to their booth. "Sitting, what's it look like."

Carter stared at him, confused. He didn't seem to notice, or care, as he continued looking through the menu intently. "Why?"

The boy sighed, setting down his menu and clasping his hands in front of him on the table. "I needed coffee. You looked slightly depressed, plus, you had the best seat in the entire place." Carter looked at him oddly before looking around them, noticing her table was probably the worst in the entire joint. "Naturally, I decided to grace you with my presence, therefore making your entire day so much better."

"Has anyone ever called you a dick before?" Carter asked, leaning forward a bit in her seat. Boys were the most annoying species on the entire planet. They should all get eaten by sharks.

"Couple of people have," the boy consented with a shrug.

Carter smirked and pulled out a pen, "No idea why.."

She looked at The Bucket List in frustration. Lola had only given her ten slots to fill in, only ten things to do before she died. It honestly didn't sound that hard when Carter had agreed to it, but as she tried to narrow down all the things she had always said she would do before death came knocking, it was turning out to be the list from hell.

Bertie came by and took mystery boy's order, giving Carter a knowing smile which she chose to ignore, before walking back into the kitchen. Feeling the boy's eyes on her, Carter looked up from the ticket uncertain.

"What?"

The boy frowned and read the title upside down. "You about to die or something?" He asked the question in a joking manner, not expecting for Carter to shrug. He looked at her in what seemed to be shock, not believing her the first time.

"Supposedly."

"That's fucked up," the boy said in a low voice and Carter couldn't help but agree. She was seventeen for god's sake, she was too young to freaking die.

She let out a laugh and sighed. "It is, isn't it?"

Bertie came with the boy's food and she gave Carter a wink and a pat on the shoulder before leaving. Carter laughed and shook her head. The boy smiled at her and dug into his pancakes. He looked as Carter filled in _Concert_ next to number ten and read the other two filled in slots.

"Never been to Boston?" he inquired, pointing his fork to number three, dripping syrup on the ticket. Carter whiped it away with a frown. The boy gave her an apologetic look.

"My dad's not one for travel," she explained.

The boy nodded, not quite understanding but not pushing the matter further. The two sat in silence while Carter though and the boy finished his pancakes. He continued to sit at the table, watching Carter until he jumped and pulled out a vibrating phone. With a curse he shut the phone and started getting out of the booth.

"I"ve gotta get going," he said, standing up and leaving a handful of bills on the table, "I'm late for school as it is. You need a ride?" It took a second for what the boy asked to sink in.

Carter laughed and shook her brown head, "Dropped out."

"No shit," the boy said with a laugh. "Didn't take you as a drop out type of girl."

Carter just shrugged and smiled. "I get that a lot."

The boy smirked and bent down, reading her name tag carefully. "Well," he paused and gave Carter a raised eyebrow, "Isn't Carter a boy's name?"

"Dad wanted a boy," she explained quickly and the boy nodded in understanding.

"Well, Carter," he emphasized her name as he started walking backwards towards the door, "I fear I must leave you to your own devices." He placed a hand over his heart dramatically, "I know that you, fair lady, are heartbroken at this time, but please, know that I shall come back for you one day," he paused, "-eth."

Carter laughed and covered her smiling face with a hand as the boy bowed and smirked at her. "I promise not to cry over your departure, kind sir," Carter said, laughing still.

"Do try," the boy answered, giving her a final grin before turning and weaved his way towards the door, the bell dinging as it closed behind him.

Carter let out a giggle, picking up her and the boy's plate, along with his money and headed towards the back. The Bucket List rest once again in her apron pocket, waiting to be filled out.


	2. Don't feed me violence

**Wow. I'm seriously impressed by the reaction I'm getting from this already. Thanks to those who reviewed. To those who put me on alert, thanks as well. You guys should feel loved, I'm writing huge ass chapters for you. This one beats the last, so hopefully you'll all enjoy it. Reviews are like heroine, feed the addiction.**

**For future reference: **Carter has liver cancer. This has spread to her bones, which has taken on stage three. She would've been a junior is she was still in school. There will be NO Chase in this story. None, zilch, notta. Sorry, too many people do it. Also, Carter does NOT have The Power. Once again, it's almost becoming cliché nowadays. Reid may seem OOC to many, but I got a different vibe from him in the movie. Yes, he's a badass, but not a complete dick all the time. Carter's cat, C.A.T, is pronounced CEE-AY-TEE.

**I own nothing. It's quite sad, really.**

**Chapter Two**

_Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting._

"Need. Coffee," Carter said, slumping onto a swiveling stool at the front counter, looking at Lola pathetically. She'd gotten off shift three hours ago and had spent her 'free time' shopping for her house. Apparently, you needed food to live and her house was completely void of the stuff. Getting hit on by the geek-wad cashier and not being able to find the ho-hos made her afternoon less than pleasant. She needed **coffee**.

Lola stared at through her curtain of red hair and shook her head, picking up a cup from beneath the counter and filled it with hot water. Carter looked at the ceramic cup in disgust as Lola dropped a tea bag in the water, turning the clear water murky almost instantly.

"What the hell is this?" Carter asked, lifting up the odd smelling concoction in almost fear.

"Herbal tea, you d-bag," Lola said, wiping down the counter with a wet rag. "No caffeine. Doctor's orders."

Carter gaped at her friend as she casually continued with her end of shift cleaning. She looked down at her tea in pure disgust and stood up with a sigh. Ignoring her friend's questioning glance, Carter walked around the counter and dumped the tea out in the sink. Picking up a new cup, she filled it with half decaf coffee and grabbed a handful of French Vanilla creamer pods.

"This is a coffee cup, Lo," Carter said, sitting back down at her original seat. Starting to unseal her creamer, she looked at Lola like she was talking to a four year old. "You put coffee in a coffee cup. Not tea, not soda, coffee. Hence the name "coffee cup"!" Air quotes were used.

Yes, Carter knew she was being immature and childish, but she wanted coffee. And Lola was coming between her and her beloved coffee. Not good.

Lola laughed at her friend's antics, though didn't apologize. "Just looking out for you." With a grumble, Carter flipped her the bird and held her cup close to her, breathing in the flumes. Lola laughed harder, disappearing into the back seconds later.

The door dinged and Carter turned around, surprised to see the blond boy from earlier walking towards her. She laughed at his clothes, and instantly knew he was a Spenser kid. Rich, mighty, power, and stuck up for the most part. That's all you had to be to get into Spenser, rich being the most influential.

With a sigh, the boy sat down beside a still laughing Carter, who was trying to hide it in her coffee, and loosened his tie casually. "What the hell are you laughing at, Cart?"

"Didn't take you for a private school type of guy," She said, giggling and motioning towards his uniform with a wave of her hand.

"Don't insult the uniform, babe," he said seriously, glancing at a menu, "Chicks dig it."

Carter patted the boy on the shoulder comfortingly. "Sure they do."

Boy wiggled his eyebrows suggestively, "Trust me, they do."

"Perv," Carter stated, taking a drink of her sugary decaf coffee. Boy just shrugged his shoulders with a smirk. "How was school?"

Boy stiffened but shrugged his shoulders casually. "You're not missing anything by dropping out," he said with a sour face.

Carter just laughed, not bothering to tell Boy that she'd rather be in school than work full time. Before dropping out, school had been her life. She'd been hoping to go to William and Mary one day, but that dream was long gone. Family came first though, and it wasn't like the rent was going to pay itself. It pissed Carter off none the less, she was the kid, not her dad. Sure, Denny's was great an all, but it wasn't what she wanted to be doing for the rest of her life. No pun intended..

Boy's phone rang, or rather vibrated, and he let out a curse at the caller ID. Flipping it open he gave Carter a pleading look. "Can you get me a coffee?" He grinned when she nodded her head and turned back to his phone.

"What?"

She was surprised to hear his voice had gone cold and almost harsh. She studied his face, seeing that even his eyes looked different while he was talking to the person on the other line. He didn't seem like the boy from lunch, but she couldn't be one to judge. It wasn't like Carter had known him for more than six hours.

Carter jumped down from her stool and walked around the counter, trying not to listen to Boy's conversation. Though, it was a bit difficult. She filled out a green cup full of coffee and started back towards Boy.

"Why the hell you always gotta think it's me?" he yelled in a hushed voice, something a normal person would have difficulty with. "Ever think that maybe it was Baby Boy? Or, imagine this, Pogue?" Boy gave a smirk and Carter could hear the deft yelling come the other side of his phone. Boy gave a heaving sigh and leaned his head down on the counter, arm outstretched.

Sitting back next to him, Carter placed the coffee cup in front of the still arguing boy. He sat up and put the phone in front of him, almost yelling into it, "For fuck's sake, Caleb, it wasn't me!" Boy turned towards Carter with a scowl but mouthed 'thank-you' to her, taking a sip of his coffee. "School, man! And with Carter after that!"

Carter's head perked up at the sound of her name as Boy continued arguing. "Dude, don't have a fucking shit-fit. I'll be there later." Finally, Boy hung up his phone and she smirked at the sounds of the person on the other line still talking as his phone flipped shut. He took a sip of his coffee, a content look coming over his face as he did.

"If I turn up dead tomorrow," Boy said, eyes closed, "It was Caleb Danvers who did it."

"Trouble in paradise?" she inquired, eying Boy's coffee intently. She glanced around the diner, looking for any signs of Lola as Boy shook his head which was still on the counter top. He didn't seem to notice when Carter darted her hand out, snatching up the coffee. The _real_ coffee, no decaf puddle shit stuff, the actual stuff with _caffeine_. **Heaven.**

"Just dumb ass friends," he said finally opening his eyes to see Carter with his coffee in her hand, a goofy grin on her face. "What the hell!" he reached forward and snatched back his coffee as Carter frowned, pouting slightly. "You have you're own!"

"But it's _decaf_, the hated love child of coffee and health!" She whined, reaching forward in attempts to get more actual coffee. Boy laughed at her reference to her decaf coffee, surprised by her analogy of it.

"You're a freak," Boy said, sliding his coffee down to her with a laugh. Carter gave a squeal of delight and was about to take another sip when the swinging door opened, revealing Lola.

"CARTER JANE MURPHY!" she screeched, making both Carter and Boy to wince at the high pitch. "PUT **DOWN** THE CUP!" Lola walked forward, grabbing the cup from a pouting Carter and looked at a confused Boy angrily. "Did you give her this?"

"It wasn't his fault," Carter defended, laughing softly at Boy's look of confusion. "I asked for it." As the words came out of her mouth, Carter knew it wasn't exactly going to have the calming affect on Lola as she'd hoped. The words oh and shit came to mind as Carter caught sight of her friend's face.

Lola turned back to her, a disappointed look on her face. She let out a sigh and handed Boy back his cup calmly. "You really want to die, don't you?"

Carter looked at her friend in complete shock and didn't have a chance to reply as her phone started playing _Say This Sooner _ by The Almost and she reached into her bag, trying to grab her phone. She looked at Lola pleadingly but she just shook her head and walked back through the swinging doors without a word. Boy looked after Lola in confusion, having no idea what the two girls were fighting about.

"Hello?" Carter asked, her voice laced with hurt. Boy watched her on the phone and noticed how her face fell when the other line starting talking.

"Where the hell are you?"

Carter sighed, _this should be good_. "Hi Dad."

"Get your ass home, now," his voice was angry and more than likely drunk, again. He slammed his phone down and Carter flipped her phone closed gently. She turned and bent down to pick up her bag, pulling out her car keys.

"I gotta go," she announced, looking at Boy with tired eyes. Boy nodded his head, not asking about the phone call, figuring it would be best not too. Carter looked up from her bag, keys in hand, staring at Boy with a light of realization. He gave her an odd look, questioningly.

"What?"

Carter snorted and pulled a stray bang behind her ear, still looking at him. "I don't even know your name."

She found it funny that although they weren't exactly friends, more like newly found acquaintances, that she didn't know his name. Odd, wasn't it? In all honesty, Carter had simply been referring to him in her mind as Boy. Rather rude, but what was a girl supposed to do when the guy didn't give her his name?

Boy laughed and reached out his hand, coffee cup still glued to the other. "I'm Reid Garwin," he, Reid, said with a smirking grin.

Carter took his hand with smile, shaking it quickly. "Nice to meet you Reid," she said, walking backwards towards the door. "I'll see you around."

As she walked out the door, Carter thought she heard a soft 'You can count on it.'.

--

Pulling her car into the small gravel driveway that led to her, less than great, home, Carter let out a deep sigh. She twisted her keys from the ignition, debating which would be worse. Going in or making a mad run for it back into town. Lola got off at five but she'd probably still be hanging around for at least another half hour. Plus, Lo's couch was pretty much the comfiest one around.

Just as Carter was about to restart her car and make her run back to Denny's, she saw the curtain in the family room window move, revealing a flash of her father's stocky stature. She winced, so much for the plan to run for it.

She took her sweet time gathering her things from the mustang, even picking up some week old garbage to buy herself time. After five minutes of picking random things up in her car, making it almost halfway clean, Carter figured she didn't have much more time before her dad came out and would physically force her into the house. Grabbing a last candy wrapper off the floor and slinging the grocery bags from earlier over one arm, she headed towards the front door, kicking her car door shut with her foot.

Somehow Carter was able to fish her keys from her pocket and unlock the front door, having to lift it up on it's hinges slightly to be able to slide the lock back. One of the luxuries of having a crap ass home. There was nothing at all nice about her home, not in the slightest. Doors were missing from rooms, windows were cracked, and the floors always creaked. It wouldn't surprise Carter in the lease if the people living in it before her had made it into a crack house. Slamming the door behind her, she dropped her bag on the floor and slipped off her shoes. Carefully, Carter started down the front hall, leaving the grocery bags on a table in the hall.

"Dad?" she called out, surprised not to see him in front of the television in the den. Walking further into the house, she found her dad sitting at the kitchen table, looking through the mail. "Hey Dad," Carter said tentatively, not walking into the kitchen, instead leaning against the door frame, leaving distance between herself and her dad.

"You're late," Robert said, not looking up from the mail, dividing it up between the things for himself and Carter.

"I had to work today," she explained, though remembered having the same conversation with him the day before. It was always the same, everyday. The only thing that changed was his reaction, which all depended on how much he'd had to drink before she got home. By the smell that was wafting towards her, Carter guessed things weren't going to go as well as she'd hoped.

"You worked yesterday."

Carter shrugged, even though her dad didn't see it. "Sam was sick yesterday, so I took his shift. I didn't think you'd mind if I picked up a few extra hours."

"You were late today."

She squirmed, his voice was getting tenser already. "We needed food. I got you some salami," she tried with a hopeful smile. "I know how you like salami."

Her dad slammed his fist on the rickety table, sending letters to the floor as Carter winced and jumped. "I don't care about god damn deli meat!" He stood up, taking a few steps towards her menacingly. Carter involuntarily stepped backwards and into the hallway. "Paul and I are going out for a few drinks. When I get back, this house had better be spotless," he pointed a chubby finger at her, a serious look on his already drunk face. "I mean that, fucking spotless. You got that?"

"Got it, Dad," Carter said softly as he brushed past her, fumbling to get his coat from the rack. He said nothing else to her before walking out the door, slamming it behind him. His heavy footsteps sounded on the front porch and she heard a car pull up and then a door slam shut.

She let out a sigh, leaning against the door way heavily. Glancing around the dirty kitchen and laundry room, Carter realized how much cleaning she had to do before her dad came home. Looking at the clock, reading five thirty six, she guessed that eight hours was all the time she would get before he came home. Hopefully, if Carter didn't get all of it done, he would be too drunk to notice.

Maybe.

--

Three hours later, Carter fell onto her couch with a groan. All around her clean floor and dusted counter tops. The entire Crack House, as she 'affectionately' called it, was clean. Spotless, in fact. She had even caught up on all the laundry and cleaned out the fridge, which had been in desperate need of new food. IT hadn't been nearly as hard as she had thought, and hadn't taken much time. It was only just nearly nine o'clock.

Surfing through the channels on the small television, Carter finally settled on _Scrubs_. The show always made her laugh, not to mention that Turk was freaking hot when he played Petey in _Remember the Titans_. Guys in uniform, most of them anyways, always got to Carter. Don't ask why, it was just one her things. Lola happened to like any boy with green eyes, as in, _any_ boy. She wouldn't care if he had man boobs and a bad case of acne so long as he had _green_ eyes. Well, maybe not..

Carter was brought out her _Scrubs _worshiping when her phone started singing. Or rather Aaron Gillespie did. She leaped off the couch and dashed down the hall, fumbling to get her phone out before it ceased to ring.

"Hello?" she asked, sliding down the length of the front door, leaning her back against it as Carter sat on the hall floor.

"Hey princess," a voice answered from the other line. Carter could hear music blasting in the background, but didn't know why Reid, of all people, was calling her. Or how he got her number for that matter. "Lola gave me your number," he said, reading her mind. Quite a feat, seeing the distance between them.

Note sarcasm.

"What's up Reid?"

The music faded away slightly as she heard his feet crunching on leaves, or at least, that's what Carter guessed. "I'm at a party," he yelled, apparently thinking she wouldn't be able to hear him over the blasting music.

Carter let out a snort. "You stalked Lola for my number just to call and tell me that? I feel honored."

"You should," he said and Carter could almost hear his smirk over the line. A door opened on his end and the music disappeared. "You doing anything tonight?"

He couldn't be serious. "I'm not coming over," Carter stated seriously, standing up and walking down her hall. Parties weren't her thing. Especially now, her being a drop out and all didn't sit well with much of the 'popular crowd'. More than likely Reid was out partying with a bunch of private school kids with cash to blow and kegs to drink. Most definitely _not_ her scene.

"C'mon, Cart!" Reid whined, reminding Carter of a five year old. "I'm surrounded by bimbos and jocks. Savvveee meee!"

Carter laughed at his childish voice. "No."

"Please?"

"No."

There was a pause on the other end of the line. "I'll buy you coffee tomorrow."

Low blow, Garwin.

Carter debated. Was coffee really worth a night of partying with Reid and other such rich kids?

Hell yes.

"Where are you?"

Reid laughed. "I'll pick you up in ten minutes. Wear something hot," he hung up the phone before Carter could say anything. She closed her phone with a sigh, not even going to question how Reid knew where she lived. Jumping to her feet, Carter sprinted up the stairs, proceeding to tear apart her closet in attempts to find something decent to wear.

Eight minutes and counting.

**Feed the addiction. Review.**


	3. Just run with me

**You people like me too much. Holy shit, six reviews on only my second chapter? People, I do feel the love. I was bored today and happen to sick, so I figured, what the hell, write, Fin, write! I'm getting good at writing huge chapters, this one beats the last two. Go me. Thanks to everyone who reviewed. Honestly, I feel way over loved, but no complaints. Feed the addiction, review some more.**

**For future reference: **It's the July before the movie. Carter is NOT on chemo, she's done it before but isn't any more. No reason to. Lola is two years older than Carter. I don't like Kate. There will probably be something for future reference every chapter.

**I own nothing. But I did get a hair cut today. It kicks pretty much all ass.**

**Chapter Three**

_It was beautiful and simple, as truly great swindles are._

The once clean floor, that Carter had spent an hour cleaning, of her bedroom was covered with clothing. None of which she could wear to the party with Reid. Glancing at the clock, Carter saw that even thought Reid was late, she was still in a purple tank and her spider man boxers. Granted, they were amazing boxers and she didn't look half bad in them, but Carter didn't exactly want to go to a party with Reid looking like she was at a costume party. She looked at the clock, Reid was late and she _still_ didn't have clothes to wear.

"Shit!"

Running down the stairs at top speed, Carter dug through her bag and pulled out her phone. Hitting speed dial, she tapped her bare foot waiting for Lola to pick up. She knew that Lola was probably still mad at her, but desperate times called for desperate measures. Such as calling your best friend to find the perfect outfit, despite huge fight.

"Hello?" her voice was groggy and Carter winced at remembering that Lola had to open in the morning. Getting up at four to make it on time by five always meant going to bed around nine, Carter sometimes even crashed around eight. Gotta get in those eight hours of sleep. Growing kids and all.

"I know you hate me right now and think I'm suicidal," Carter spoke in a rush, taking her steps two at a time and walking back into her room, trekking through the piles of clothes on the floor. "But it's your fault that you gave Reid my number. Therefore, by default, it's your fault that he's on his way to take me to a party. Which means it's also your fault that I have nothing to wear!"

"What the hell are you talking about?" Lola had definitely been asleep when she'd called. She was stupidly out of it. Great.

"I have nothing to wear!" Carter yelled, falling into her pile of clothes on the floor. She found it pathetic. Never before had Carter worried about what she was going to wear to a party. Not that during her high school career she'd been to many, but she normally just showed up in whatever she was wearing.

Lola laughed, sleep still evident in her voice. "Wear your red and purple checkered shirt with a white lacy thing underneath. Black jeans will look great with that." White lacy thing, that was a very nice description of about six different shirts Carter currently had. She decided to just pick the first one she could find.

Carter quickly sifted through her clothes, looking for the items her friend had suggested. Thankfully, all of them were clean. "I love you Lo!" Victory!

"I know," she said with a yawn. "Good luck tonight," her phone clicked off and Carter tossed hers onto the bed carelessly. So maybe Lola wasn't still completely mad at her for the coffee incident. If she had been, Carter would've been wearing a pink Elmo shirt instead.

Downstairs, the doorbell rang just as Carter managed to pull on her jeans and slipped a keyboard belt on them. She ran down the stairs, pulling the red shirt on over her white undershirt and opened the door. Reid stood there, one arm on the door frame, the rest of him leaning against it. He wore a loose dark blue shirt, jeans, and his black skate shoes from earlier. It didn't surprise Carter at all to see his fingerless gloves still intact.

"You're late," she said, motioning him in with a jerk of her head.

Reid straightened up and walked in, taking in her bare feet and the red shirt that was still halfway pulled up. "Good thing. Looks like you needed it." He smirked that annoying smirk that Carter was beginning to think had a permanent reservation on his face.

Carter glared at him as she walked up the broken stairs, "Not like you gave me a whole lot of time to get ready, ass." She was actually quite proud of her abilities, most girls would take an hour to get ready. Being the amazing girl she was, Carter had only taken around ten.

"Pressure's good for you," Reid called up to her with a laugh, still waiting by the door for her.

She slipped on a pair of green socks and slid down the short hall. She hesitated at the top of the stairs and walked back to her room, grabbing her Denny's shirt and apron off her desk chair. Bouncing down the stairs she kicked her chucks off one of the steps. Sitting down on the bottom step, Carter looked up at him while pulling them on. "So where's this party?"

Reid shrugged, and she raised an eyebrow at him. "Just some girl's house."

Carter laughed. Typical. "Alrighty then," she stood up and raised her arms. "Look okay?" She twirled around jokingly while Reid leaned against the hall wall, observing.

"A bit hobo-ish," Reid said with a smirk, ducking when Carter reached forward to smack him on the head. "Seriously, you look great." He held his hands up in surrender and she nodded in agreement.

"Thank you," she said in a sing song voice, going into the hall closet, almost disappearing into it.

"Girls," Reid said with a smirk, walking towards the door while Carter unhooked her bag from the hall closet, newly organized, and stuffed her apron and shirt inside the plaid bag, not caring if either got wrinkled.

"You planning on doing some role-play later?" Reid asked with a smirk, catching sight of her uniform.

"Not with you," Carter said, opening up her front door and waiting for Reid, who still had a smirk on his face, to follow her out. She pulled the door up and locked it, not caring if her dad didn't have a key. His own fault for going out without a key to get drunk. Not that he'd be able to get in with a key while he was drunk anyways.

She stopped short at the sight of the huge black Hummer parked behind her tiny mustang. "What the hell is that?" Carter asked pointing at the huge piece of metal that Reid was steering her towards gently. She looked up to see Reid laughing at her.

"This would be a Hummer, babe," he said, opening the passenger side door for her. She climbed inside in almost awe. Reid just smirked at her childlike reaction and closed the door for her, walking over to climb in the driver's side.

"This is so freaking cool!" Carter said excitedly, only a few minutes later. They were speeding down the road, Reid going almost twenty miles over the speed limit, and Carter had to admit that the Hummer was nice. For a gas guzzling, environment killing, ice melting, huge ass piece of metal that is.

Reid shook his head, keeping his eyes on the road. "You're so easy to please."

Carter looked at him with a smile. "So I've been told."

She reached forward and turned on the Sirius radio panel and her eyes lit up. Quickly, ignoring Reid's smirking, she scrolled through the channels and landed on a dance club station, nearly jumping up and down at the song that was playing. Seventeen Forever blasted out of the surround speakers and Carter quickly started singing along, much to Reid's amusement. He was surprised to find she had a decent voice.

"We're one mistake from being together," she sang bobbing her head with an almost goofy grin, "But let's not ask why it's not right. You won't be seventeen forever. And we can get away with this tonight."

Reid looked over once the song ended with a smirk. "And you called me a perv?"

Metro Station was replaced by a Rihanna song and Carter quickly changed the channel with a disgusted look. An acoustic version of _The Scientist_ came through and she leaned back against the car seat. Reid looked down at the channel she had picked, never having listened to _The Coffee House_ before.

"The guy's in love," Carter said with a shrug, running a hand through her hair, trying to get the rads out. "Plus, if you thought that was bad, listen to Control sometime," she waggled her eyebrows suggestively. "_That_ is a dirty song."

Reid looked over at her with a smirk as he pulled into a long driveway. "I'll take your word for it." He parked the Hummer halfway down the drive way, behind a line of other cars.

Carter leaned forward and took one look at the house and shook her head. This hadn't been a good idea. The place was like a fucking castle for freak's sake! Who the hell lives in a castle? Other than the Queens and vampires? She attempted to count the number of windows were on the wall facing her but lost count when Reid opened her door and pulled her out.

"Holy shit," she said, following behind Reid who had hold of her hand, lightly leading her towards the menacing vampire lair. Seriously, any second a bunch of bats would come screaming out of the windows and eat them alive. "Who the hell lives in this place?"

"My friend's girlfriend's friend or something like that," Reid said, not bothering to knock on the front door. He paused, the door slightly open and turned back to an awed Carter. "Ready, babe?"

Carter nodded, already hearing the blasting music. She let out a sigh, "You had better give me some fucking good coffee, Reid." She gave him a serious look.

"Pinkie promise," he said with a smirk, pushing open the door.

The music, which happened to rappy hip hop, the scorn of all music, hit them full force as Reid led her into the throng of people. He kept hold of her hand as he navigated his way skillfully through the hordes of people. Looking at the number of high school kids in the house, Carter guessed everyone form his school had showed up.

Oh, joy.

"That's Aaron Abbot," Reid yelled over the pounding music, pointing a finger to a tall boy with curly hair and a letter jacket on who was standing with a red head in the corner. He didn't look like the nicest of people to Carter. "He's a jackass, treats girls like shit. Stay away from him," Reid warned, continuing on through all the people. Carter didn't argue with his advice, good plan.

"Abbot's an ass," Carter repeated to herself, "Will rape with eyes if seen. Got it."

Reid laughed and led them down a hall and into a darker room that held a pool table. The music was different, more rock and roll than down and dirty, much to Carter's relief. The whole rap 'yo, I'ma gansta' didn't exactly qualify itself as actual music. More like people doing beat box, badly, and attempting to rhyme. But that was Carter's opinion. Most didn't agree with her, she seemed to be alone in her taste in music. Lola refused to ever speak of music with her, they always ended up fighting about it. _These Are The Days_ came on over the speakers that were positioned in the corners of the large room and Carter thanked whoever was in control of the music.

"You any good at pool?" Reid asked, leading her to where a tall boy with dark hair was playing against two others. The dark haired boy grinned at the sight of Reid and abandoned the table, making his way over the them. Reid released Carter's hand and did the whole 'manly hand/hug' thing with his friend.

"Where the hell'd you go?" the boy asked Reid, not seeming to notice Carter who was looking around the room curiously.

She knew a few of the boys from the Spenser baseball team, Lola's cousin was a Spenser guy and graduated the year before. Thankfully, Carter happened to love baseball so Lola always dragged her along to Mark's games. Lola had fallen in love with Robbie, the catcher, with, of course, the "most amazing eyes I ever have seen! I think I'm in LOVE". Exact words, sadly enough. Nothing ever happened between them though, once Lola found out he wore contacts he wasn't quite so lovable. The girl was a freak at times.

Carter waved at Thomas, the pitcher from Mark's team and he waved back, a bit surprised to see her. She looked back to Reid to see him and his friend watching her, amused looks on both their faces. Her face flushed a faint pink when Reid smirked. "Hi," she said, sticking out her hand for the other boy, "I'm Carter."

He took her hand, gently shaking it with a bright smile. "Tyler Simms."

She hadn't noticed it before, but both Reid and Tyler could be in toothpaste commercials. Blinding teeth, both of em. Carter watched as the two boys walked towards the pool table and stood back watching. Toothpaste wasn't the only thing they could model she thought with a smirk.

"See something you like, babe?" Reid asked, breaking Carter's train of thought. His stupid god damned smirk was still in place, ass.

Carter shook her head with a smirk of her own and walked up behind him. "I think I'm good."

Reid shrugged his shoulders, picking up a pool stick from the rack. "Your loss, darling."

"I'll keep that in mind," Carter said laughing. She jumped onto the pool table, sitting on the edge of it while Reid and Tyler played against two other boys around Reid's age. Tyler looked younger, probably closer to her age. She'd just turned seventeen three weeks ago, officially making her two years younger than Lola, much to her displeasure.

"You're kind of in the way, Cart," Reid said coming around the edge of the pool table, motioning his hand towards the cue ball that was resting behind her.

She jumped down with a sigh as Reid bent over to hit the ball. With a smile, Carter leaned over, putting her mouth next to his ear. "Don't miss," she said softly. Childishly, she poked him in the side before pulling away, a little depressed when Reid made the shot. He smirked at her as he walked back over to where Tyler was on the other side of the table.

"Nice try."

Carter shrugged her shoulders and snapped her fingers dramatically. "Damn it." Reid just shook his head and went back to his pool game. She looked around the room again, and didn't see Thomas anywhere. Glancing back, seeing Reid still involved with his game, Carter walked out of the packed pool room and back towards the front room with the bad music.

It seemed like the room had gotten smaller, or more people where jammed into it. She had to elbow her way through the crowd to the stairs. She climbed over a few couples that thought the stairs would be a perfect make out place and searched through the people for any familiar faces. Seeing no signs of Thomas or any of the other ball players, Carter started walking back to where Reid was probably still playing pool with Tyler.

She turned around and stopped short, coming face to face with a chest. As in, a freaking huge, rock hard, 'I am a wall!' short of chest. Looking up, Carter almost groaned. Of course, once she left the safe side of Reid, she'd get eye raped. Ewwwww.

Aaron stuck out his hand, which was humongous compared to Carter's small one. "I'm Aaron," he said, giving her, what he probably hoped was a winning smile. Carter took one look at the bear trap hand and started pushing past him. "I've never seen you around before," he said, following behind her closely. He grabbed her shoulder, spinning her around, not exactly harsh but not the most gentle of moves either. "You got a name, baby?"

"Yeah," Carter said, reaching up and picking up Aaron's hand from her shoulder and quickly dropped it. "But I'm not about to tell you." She turned around, hoping that the crowd would part like the Red Sea for her, but apparently no one noticed her Moses like appearance that night.

"Aw, why not?" Aaron asked, still following Carter at an uncomfortable distance. She looked over her shoulder and was unpleased to see him still there.

"Please stop stalking me," she said loudly, making sure he heard her over the eardrum bursting music. It came out rudely, but Carter didn't honestly care.

Aaron laughed, thinking she was trying to be funny. "Tell me your name and I'll leave you alone."

Carter snorted and stopped quickly, turning around to face Aaron angirly. She pointed a finger in his face, hoping to make her point known. "Leave me the fuck alone already! Go stalk some stupid-ass bimbo blond with no brains. I'm sure you two would get along great!" Carter knew her face was turning red from anger but Abbot was getting on her nerves. Where the hell was Reid? Aren't boys supposed to come save the girl at this point in time? Hello? Knight in Shining Armour? You're Damsel in Distress is calling!

Aaron leaned forward slightly, a smirk on his face. "You're hot when you're angry, anyone tell you that before?"

"And you're an ass!" Carter yelled, spinning around and trying to make her way through the partying teens. She ended up elbowing many painfully in the side to make them move, Aaron just following behind in the path she created. Somehow, Carter pushed enough people out of the way that she made it into the hall that led into the pool room. She could feel Aaron still following her, for some unknown reason and nearly jumped for joy upon seeing Reid and Tyler.

They both noticed her come in and frowns came over their faces at the following Aaron. Reid set down his stick, Tyler following suit as he started pushing people out of the way, going over to where Carter had resumed fighting with Aaron.

"What part of 'fuck off' do you not understand?" Carter yelled, throwing her hands up in frustration when Aaron just smirked. "You're an annoying little ass."

"I do try," he said, taking a step closer to her. "Why don't you and I blow this place and go somewhere. Just you and me?" He smirked and Carter could almost see the raging hormones coming from the horny teen before her.

"No!" She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up to see Reid. "Thank fucking god."

"The lady said fuck off," Reid said with a smirk, waving a hand in dismissal to a pissed looking Aaron. He looked like he was going to say something but Reid gave him a hard look.

"This isn't over, fag," Aaron said menacingly. He glanced at a smiling Carter and turned around, pushing his way forcefully through the crowd. Carter let out a sigh and leaned heavily against Reid who smirked down at her. Tyler grinned at her before patting Reid on the shoulder and went back to the pool table, starting up a new game.

"I hate people," she said tiredly as Reid grabbed her hand and led her to a couch. They sat down, Reid's arm over Carter's shoulder. She rested her head on his shoulder with a yawn. "Thanks for the help with the Ass," she mumbled, eyes closing.

"Knight in Shining Armour at your service," Reid said, smirking even though she couldn't see it.

Carter laughed softly. "You're radar sucks ass."

**Feed the addiction. Review.**


	4. Through rows of speeding cars

**I love you guys, seriously. My heart is freaking amazed by the feedback I'm getting on this. I watched the movie again today and can not wait until I finally get to the movie part of this. It shall be sweet, let me tell you. Lots of planning to do. Here's an update for all of you who, like **alygdgrl**, is now addicted. Woooh, I feel like a drug dealer.**

**For future reference: **_** I am an idiot. Because of my stupidity, Reid's in summer school.**_ Spenser is open during the summer to students who don't want to go home for break. Reid didn't want to go home. I have a picture of what I think Carter looks like. Ask for it. Ange is married to Reid, sorry to break so many hearts in one day. Carter WILL NOT be taken by Chase during the movie section of the story.

**I still own pretty much nothing. My life is rather sad and pitiful, ask anyone.**

**Chapter Four**

_All of us learn to write in the second grade. Most of us go on to greater things._

Reid nudged the sleeping girl beside him gently in the side, hoping to wake her up. People were starting to file out of the house, it was nearing two in the morning. Caleb and Pogue hadn't showed up, but Reid wasn't all that heartbroken about it. Seeing Caleb would probably have ended in a huge blow out over using. It was beginning to become an everyday fight between them, much to the annoyance of everyone.

It honestly didn't make any sense to Reid why Caleb was always nagging on him about using. He knew the consequences of becoming addicted and Reid didn't have plans of becoming like Caleb's father. He wasn't stupid. But if Reid only had six more months to use, he was going to take full advantage of it before using wasn't an option anymore. Caleb didn't seem to understand he was just trying to live in the moment.

Carter groaned and flopped down on the couch beside her, using her arms for pillows. She shied away when Reid poked her in the ribs gently. "Go away, Garwin," Carter grumbled, burying her head deeper into her arms. She felt Reid shift his weight as he poked her again in the sides and she scootched further away from him, eyes still closed.

"We gotta go," Reid said, standing up and stretching looking down at Carter, waiting for her slowly climb to her feet. Tyler had left a couple hours before hand, something about having to make curfew. It made Reid laugh when Tyler turned back into a mama's boy, his parent's could care less what time he came home at. Just so long as he wasn't trashed. "Seriously, Cart. I should be getting you home."

She let out a heavy sigh and stood up, running a hand through her hair and looked at him bleary eyed. "What time is it?" Carter reached down and picked her bag up from the floor, brushing off unknown crumbs from it with a frown.

Reid looked at the coke clock on the wall, almost blinded by the neon lights surrounding it. "It's almost three," he told her, slinging an arm over her shoulder, starting to steer her towards the door when Carter stopped dead. He looked back, surprised to see her face had gone pale and she had a look of almost fear in her brown eyes. "What's wrong?"

"I can't go home," Carter said, still not moving away from the couch. "Oh holy shit, I can't go home."

She sat back onto the couch, staring ahead of her, mumbling things to herself quietly. Reid stared at her in confusion, not understanding in the least what Carter was going on about. He took a few steps closer to her, crouching down in front of her with a slightly concerned look on his face. "What the hell are you going on about? Why can't you go home?"

Carter looked at him with wide brown eyes, running a frantic hand through her messy hair nervously. "He'll kill me!" she said, jumping in her seat only to be pushed down by Reid again. "Like, dice me up into teeny tiny pieces and feed me to a lobster! Or he'll hide me around the house! Shit! I locked the front door! He's gonna boi-" She looked down at Reid's hand that was covering her mouth in surprise and quickly stopped talking.

"So," he said, trying to sort through what Carter had been rambling about, which was proving slightly difficult. "You can't go home because you locked the front door and you're Dad is going to chop you up in little bits?"

"And eaten by a lobster," Carter added, completely serious.

Reid stood up, pulling Carter up with him by the hand. He patted her on the shoulder comfortingly. "Since I don't want you to be eaten by a lobster," he said, leading her through the almost empty house by the hand, "You can crash at my place tonight."

Carter looked at him in shock, stopping again. Reid laughed at her face and walked back to her, re-grabbing her hand and opened the front door for her. "Tyler's staying at his parents house tonight," he explained, giving her a reassuring look. "You can have his bed."

He reached into the pocket of his jeans, pulling out a pair of car keys. Stopping in front of a sleek sliver car, Reid unlocked the passenger side and gestured towards the open door to Carter. She stared at hi for a minute before sliding into the open seat and fastened her belt while Reid closed the door and walked over to his side. They drove down the highway in silence, Reid focusing on the road and Carter staring out the window into the dark.

"Thank you," she said softly, breaking the quiet. She looked over at the blond, sincerity written clearly over her face.

Reid just shrugged his shoulders and turned into a large parking lot. "Don't want you eaten by a lobster," he said, putting the car into park and carefully pulling his keys from the ignition. "Now, if it had been a clam eating you, it'd be a different story."

Carter laughed and unbuckled her belt and climbed out of the car, shaking her head. Spenser loomed over head, looking dark and menacing against the full moon in the velvet blue sky. What was with all the creepy buildings tonight?

"You would live in a fucking horror house," Carter whispered, following close behind Reid as they walked through the heavy wooden front doors. Their footsteps echoed through the entire building as they climbed the flight of stairs that took them to Reid's floor. She stood close to him as he unlocked the door to his room, looking down the empty hall with a shudder. The place scared the shit out of her, any second a ghost would come floating through the wall.

So, she was a huge ass scaredy cat. Bit whoop. She'd watched too many scary movies with Lola over the years. In all honesty, Carter hated, with a burning passion, scary movies. But for some unknown psychopathic reason Lola loved the guts out of scary movies. Literally.

"Scared?" Reid asked, opening the door to his room, noticing her tense standing.

Carter just walked past him without answering, happy to be out of the dark and empty hall. She was slightly surprised to see that despite knowing two teen boys lived in the room, it was fairly clean. There were a few boxers up against one wall, probably waiting to be unpacked or to be moved out. Which, Carter wasn't sure. Both beds were made, messily, and only a few pieces of clothing covered the floor.

"Wow," Carter said in awe, taking a few steps into the room, giving Reid room to close his door. "You're room is cleaner that mine." It was true, even before she'd covered everything with the contents of her closet, his room was still cleaner than hers had been. Scary.

Reid laughed, tossing his keys onto a desk that sat beneath one of the two windows in the room. "Baby Boy's a neat freak." She guessed that Baby Boy was meant to be Tyler.

Carter nodded her head and sat down on the closet bed as Reid disappeared into the bathroom. She looked at the night stand and knew it was Tyler's bed. There was a picture of him and a girl smiling into the camera, his arm over her shoulder. They looked happy. There were a few more, ones with who Carter guessed were his mom and dad. She took a glance at the clock at suddenly realized she was really tired.

Laying down on the bed, not even bothering to take off her shoes, Carter closed her eyes. She didn't mean to fall asleep, but when Reid came out of the bathroom he found a fast asleep girl on his bed. _So much for Tyler's bed._ He sighed and fell onto his friend's bed. Kicking off his shoes, he flipped onto his side and closed his eyes.

--

Carter awoke to a sharp pain in her side. She glanced at the clock with tired eyes and sighed, seeing that she had only gotten an hours worth of sleep. Quietly, looking to make sure Reid was still asleep, Carter slipped off the bed and walked into the bathroom. She flipped on the light and shuffled over to the cabinet above the sink.

Opening it, she grabbed the white bottle that had a Tylenol label on it. She counted out four and popped them into her mouth, dry swallowing them easily. Carter put back the bottle and closed the cabinet door, jumping when Reid's face appeared behind her.

"God, Reid," Carter said, turning around with a hand over her heart in surprise. "Don't do that!"

He gave her a sleepy smirk, pushing himself off of the door frame he'd been leaning against. His blond hair stuck up at funny angles and if Carter had been more awake, mocking would've ensued. "You okay?" His question brought Carter out of her hair musings quickly.

She nodded her with a yawn, "Just side pains."

Reid looked at her, the sleep seeming to dissipate suddenly. "What do you have?"

Carter didn't have to ask what he was talking about. She was surprised he had waited as long as he did to ask. Most people didn't wait long to as how she was dying. It wasn't because they were concerned for her, more like they wanted to make sure she wasn't contagious. People were cruel and very shallow creatures.

"Hepatocellular carcinoma," Carter stated, leaning back to rest against the bathroom counter. "I was one of those lucky one in how many thousands of kids who got liver cancer at a young age."

Her voice was flat. She couldn't remember how many times she'd told her tale. It wouldn't be bad if she was in remission, free of the evil tumorous monster forming inside her body, but it was killing her. Somehow it'd come out on top, beating her.

"How long have you had it?" Reid asked softly, noticing her slightly angered face.

Carter stopped to think about it. She could remember back to before the cancer had come. Before her dad drank, before her mom died. It was a happy time. They didn't live in the Crack House back then, rather a nicely sized old Victorian house that her mother had fell in love with. Her dad was a salesman for a car dealership and her mom was a preschool teacher. But that was before. "The doctor diagnosed it when I was twelve," she said, bringing herself out of the memories. She looked at Reid, somewhat surprised to see no pity on his face.

They stood in silence, Reid in the doorway and Carter leaning against the counter. Finally, he let out a tired sigh and gestured back to his room. "Ready to go back to sleep?"

Carter nodded and he moved out of the doorway, falling back onto his bed without a word. She looked at him for a second before crawling under the covers of Tyler's bed.

"Thank you," she said quietly, turning on to her side facing away from Reid.

He stared up at the ceiling, arms propping up his head. "No problem babe."

**--**

Light streamed through Reid's open window, falling directly onto Carter's sleeping form. She swatted at the bright light sleepily as it leaked through her eyelids. Flipping over with a grumble, she attempted to go back to sleep. After what felt like hours of laying there, she turned over and looked at the clock on Tyler's bedside table.

How the hell was it already one thirty? Carter buried her head back in the pillow, breathing in the smell. It smelled good, Carter decided quickly,_really _good. Smelled like expensive but amazing cologne,coffee, and what she thought was vanilla. She had no idea how the hell Tyler got his pillow to smell so good, but she was tempted to steal it. How do people get pillows to smell like coffee?

Carter sat up abruptly, "Oh fuck," she yelled, looking at the clock again. Attempting to jump up from Tyler's bed went south as Carter fell to the ground in a heap. She jumped back to her feet, running her fingers through her hair frantically. "I'm so fired," she muttered, looking around for her shoes that had fallen off during her sleep.

She was scheduled to work at noon to seven. So far, Carter was already an hour and a half late. She was going to murdered alive.

Pulling on her shoes, she jumped one footed over to where Reid was still sleeping soundly. She fell on top of him, poking him in the sides as she did. He jerked awake as her weight landed on him and he failed around surprised. Carter continued poking him, making sure he was actually awake.

"What the hell!" Reid yelled, waving his arms around as Carter assaulted him with sharp pokes to the side. "What are you doing, you psychotic woman!" He rolled over, pulling Carter underneath him, closing his eyes and burying his head in the crock of her neck. His arms had wound themselves around her body, holding her securely beneath him.

"Reid!" Carter yelled, thumping him hard on the back as she struggled to get him off of her. She could feel him smirking and pushed him hard. "I'm late! Get your lazy ass up!"

Reid let out a groan and rolled off her, standing tiredly up. He looked down at Carter, pulling off his wrinkled shirt. She looked up at him surprised, thinking it would take more convincing. He smirked at her, picking up a clean shirt from his floor and walked into the bathroom. "Get your ass in gear, Cart!" He called, closing the door behind him.

She didn't need telling twice. Hoping that Reid would take his time in the bathroom, she pulled her shirt off over her head, leaving on her white undershirt. She quickly unfolded her wrinkled Denny's polo and pulled it on just as Reid came walking out of the bathroom, his hair fixed and looking more awake.

Carter ran over and grabbed his hand, pulling him towards the door. Reid managed to grab his keys off of his desk as Carter ran out the door, him in tow. She didn't give him a chance to lock the door as she sprinted down the hall. Reid shook his head with a grin and followed close behind.

She was turning out to be more fun than he'd thought.

--

Lola looked up from taking a elderly couple's order when the front door swung open and Carter came dashing in, hair messy and shirt on backwards. She could be seen sliding underneath the counter barrier and disappearing into the back. She let a smile come over her face when she looked out into the parking lot to see a silver Jetta pulling out onto the main road, a blond boy at the wheel.

She took the rest of the couple's order and walked towards the counter and lifted up the barrier with a smile. Putting the ticket on the wheel for Cookie, Lola pushed open the swinging doors to find Carter apologizing to an amused Stan, their manager.

"I swear it'll never happen again!" Carter said, looking about ready to fall on her hands and knees dutifully.

Stan looked over and gave Lola a smile, patting Carter on the shoulder gently. "You're one of my best girls, Cart," he said seriously, with the kindness of a grandfather, "I think I'll let this one slip." He gave her another pat on the shoulder and walked into his office, closing the door behind him.

Carter let out a sigh of relief, throwing her hands in the air in a victory pose. She spun around, coming face to face with an amused Lola. "Hey," she said, slowly dropping her arms and leaving them hang by her side.

Lola gave her an eyebrow risen smile, "You look like you had a late night," she said gesturing towards her friend's hair and backwards shirt.

"I had to crash at Reid's last night," Carter explained, pulling off her shirt and turning it around the right way before slipping it back on. "We didn't leave the party till two something."

Her friend gave her a surprised smile, "Spent the night at Reid's, huh?"

Carter laughed and picked her bag up from the floor, walking further into the bag to hang it up and punch in. "I slept in his roommates bed," she said, pulling her apron on over her shirt.

"Kinky," Lola said, leaning against the wall near Carter who gave her a look that clearly told her nothing happened.

"He was staying at his parents house, you dirty little girl," she said, throwing her friend a joking smile. "Plus, you know my dad would kill me if I came home that late. Staying at his place seemed like a good idea."

Lola just shrugged her shoulders and followed her friend back towards the kitchens. "Garwin's hot though," she said honestly, picking up her elderly couple's orders from the counter, starting to go through the swinging doors. "You gotta admit that."

Carter laughed and shook her head, not answering. She started towards the kitchen, stomach grumbling. Lola looked back at her as she walked into the front diner, plates in hand. She saw the look on Carter's face when she came running in. She'd had a good time the night before, and Lola was glad she'd given Reid Carter's number yesterday when he's come back in, asking for it.

Even though she didn't want to admit it, Lola knew Carter wasn't going to be around much longer. Liver cancer wasn't something to take lightly, especially when Carter was as young as she was and it was the second time it'd come back. Carter deserved whatever fun she could get. And she had no doubt that Reid Garwin was the perfect man for the job.

Just so long as he didn't break her heart.

**Feed the addiction, review.**


	5. The papercuts, the cheating lovers

**Me and my boyfriend just got done watching movies, and I figured, hey, why not? I figured everyone wouldn't mind some good ol' Carter/Reid time, so I bring forth _Movie Day_. Ha. Let the chaos ensue. (Let me remind people that above cool talking sounded way effing cooler in my head..) You can all groan 'LAME' now. It's kind of a filler chapter, but I need to burn some time before I get to the bigger things, such as the movie part. Have no fear, the other Sons should be coming in next chapter. Hoorah. It's shorter too, but ah well. Better than no update at all..**

**For future reference: **Chase is hot. Apparently, being a drug dealer for kids is rather easy, you just slip it into the chocolate milk. Ange, who sadly hasn't spoken to me since she and Reid got together, is going to have to forfeit him. Sorry dear, but when I have the P.A.R.B.M.O.F (people against Reid being married organization on fanfiction) coming after me, I need to think of me and myself alone. I like life.

**I now own a pretty little pretty ugly doll named Beep and Bop. It's pretty hardcore, let me tell you. But yeah, Reid.. not mine.**

**Chapter Five**

_What the hell are you doing out here, Fred? Fred, if you're real, you better tell me right now! _

"I can't believe you've never seen Fight Club!" Reid said in mock distress, throwing Carter a grin as he inserted the DVD into the player. He walked over and sat down next to the apologetic girl, turning the television on with the remote.

Carter laughed and shrugged her shoulders. "I've never been a Brad Pitt fan," she admitted, nodding at Reid's look of shock. "I've only seen him in Troy, which yes, he was great in, but he's not really my type."

Reid shook his head and clicked the play selection on the title menu. "Girl, you have no idea what the hell you've been missing out on."

She looked at him oddly and settled back further into the couch as the movie began. Watching movies with Reid hadn't been her plan for the evening but he'd called her just as her shift got over, offering her a ride home. Her car was still at her house, so Carter agreed, not wanting to have to walk home. They had been almost halfway to the Crack House when she's made the mistake of telling Reid she'd never watched a Brad Pitt film except for Troy.

That resulted in the fasted U-turn Carter had ever had the pleasure of experiencing.

Apparently, Reid was a Brad Pitt fan, to an extent that almost scared Carter. Were guys allowed to like Pitt? Either way, he'd kidnapped her and half an hour later Carter found herself being thrown into the world of an unknown person. Seriously, she'd asked Reid his name at the beginning and he simply told her he _didn't have one_.

What the hell?

--

"You met me at a very strange time in my life."

Carter watched as all of the credit card record buildings exploded, one by one. How the hell had that happened? She watched as Marla grabbed no-name boy's hand and the screen changed to show the credits. "What the hell just happened?" she asked in complete confusion, looking to Reid as he laughed and stood up from the couch, grabbing the next movie. "What happened to Tyler? Tyler was hot! A messed up little dirt bag, but a hot one! Tyler can't die!"

Reid shook his head and put in the next movie, Se7en. "Tyler died, sorry to break your heart."

"No!" she yelled, pouting when Reid just smirked at her. "I liked Tyler.." Damn, Pitt was dead. How very horrible.

"So do about fifty million other girls in the world," Reid told her, slouching back onto the couch beside her, slinging an arm over her shoulder. "Pitt will be pleased to know that another has fallen at his feet."

Carter scowled, "I didn't fall at his feet. I am simply stating that he's hot and a complete bad ass, therefore, I absolutely adore the boy." She gave a little nod of her head, seeming to end the conversation.

It wasn't a lie. Carter was one of those girls that totally melted for the bad ass. She had no idea why, she of all people would love the guy she'd never get and or want. Yeah, she loved the whole 'I'm the guy your mom warned you about' thing about a guy, but they were exactly like what everyone said about them. Even if Carter found a half decent guy with the whole bad ass aura to him, nothing would ever happen. A guy like that, like Tyler Durden, would never be held down in one place for long. Especially not for a girl like her.

She wasn't going to trick herself into thinking that she'd be the _one girl_ to change the bad boy. She'd seen all the sappy Hollywood movies where the bad boy fell for the model girl. He was a JD hoodlum and she would be the perfect little daddy's girl that was a straight A student, destined for great things. They'd meet, fall in love, and the boy would give up his 'dastardly' ways to stay with the girl. Happily ever after and let the credits roll.

Of course, it would never happen in real life, but Hollywood had to make money somehow.

Carter brought herself out of her bad boy musings and focused back onto the movie, which, surprise surprise, was another Pitt flick. Joy.

--

"Oh my god," Carter breathed as the credits started rolling. She smacked Reid on the arm forcefully, wiping away a tear. "That was the saddest freaking ending in the history of all endings!"

"Great movie though," Reid said, playing with a stray piece of her hair, ignoring her rantings on the movie.

She had to admit that it was an amazing movie. Disturbing and a bit sickening at parts, but still great. After watching the last two films, Carter was starting to realize why everyone seemed to like Brad Pitt so much. The guy had talent. Plus, being steamy hot when he was younger probably didn't hurt his career any.

"Kevin Spacey is a little messed up man," Carter stated, shifting on the couch and facing Reid with an almost comically serious face. "Seriously! Who the hell skins the tips of their fingers off?" She shuddered, touching the pads of her fingers gingerly. She winced, trying to imagine what it would feel like to have them cut off. "Disgusting."

Reid reached over and caught her hands with one of his gently. "I would advise not skinning your fingers any time soon, babe," he told her seriously, a small smile on his face. "It would probably result in extreme pain."

Carter gave him a look that clearly read 'duh.' "Ya think?"

"You ready for _Meet Joe Black_?" Reid asked, pulling away from her and walking over to the television set, sifting through his movie collection.

Letting out a groan, Carter stretched out on his couch and closed her eyes. It was probably nearing one in the morning, and the days worth of work was catching up to her. She knew that eventually she _would_ have to go home, but figured that maybe she could avoid him for another couple of days. Lola had offered up her couch to her, so Carter planned on crashing there after the movie marathon was over.

The couch sagged under Reid's added weight as he lifted up her feet, and sat down, resting her feet in his lap. "You have work tomorrow?" he asked quietly as the previews, almost nine years played on the screen.

Carter shook her head sleepily. "It's my day off," she mumbled, attempting to keep her eyelids from closing.

"You can go to sleep, you know," Reid said as he watched his friend struggle to stay awake. "Tyler's still staying with his parents. You can sleep in his bed." He motioned towards Tyler's bed, which Carter had quickly figured out when she had come back was in fact _not_ the bed she'd slept in the night before.

Apparently it hadn't been Tyler's pillow that had smelt so good. Whoopsy..

She let out a deep sigh and started to get up, pulling her legs away from Reid. "I told Lola I'd stay at her place tonight," Carter explained, looking around with tired eyes for her shoes. She searched the floor confused, not seeing her chucks anywhere. She looked up to a smiling Reid, who had her shoes in hand.

"You can just crash here tonight," he told her, throwing her shoes in the corner by the door. He gave her a small smirk and clicked on the play button, starting the next Brad Pitt film. Carter watched her shoes sail over to the door and shrugged, sitting back down. Going to get them was too much effort, and she didn't mind not moving. Reid had an extremely comfortable couch. Almost better than Lola's. Almost.

She leaned against Reid, using him as a personal pillow as the movie started. He put his arm around her, holding her to him securely. As the movie continued on, Carter started thinking about her and Reid.

It was weird, even though they'd only known each other for about two days, it felt like she'd known Reid for ages. Suddenly, it was like Carter knew how Tony and Maria had felt during West Side Story. No, she didn't love Reid or anything close to it, but she felt something for him. He made her feel safe and cared about. It was hard to explain and just thinking about it confused Carter even more.

Even if she, hypothetically, loved Reid, it wouldn't matter in the slightest. He was a bad ass that probably had a steaming reputation that many girls wrote about on the bathroom stalls. Plus, Carter wouldn't risk getting involved with anyone now. She didn't have enough time left to mess with little stupid things such as love.

To her, love didn't exist. At least, not the way that so many movies had made it out to be. She hated all of those high school girls who dated a boy for two days and announced to the world she was in total and complete love with the boy. It halfway disgusted her. How could you proclaim love to a boy that you hardly knew anything about? It was simple, you couldn't.

Love was something, that if it truly did exist, would take time to grow. You don't wake up one morning and suddenly decide that you're in love. It doesn't work that way. It wasn't something that came up over night, but something that grew over time. Time, that she didn't have.

Maybe, if she'd been given a chance and lived long enough, then Carter would find love. True, undying love that would make her soul complete. But, unfortunately, she would never be given that chance. It was probably what made her hate the emotion even more. Jealous that she'd never be able to experience love, Carter just wrote it off for the most part.

It wasn't exactly like she'd been given many good examples of it at home either. Her dad honestly would care less if she came home, if it weren't for the fact that she was paying the rent on the Crack House. He'd asked her, before the drinking had gotten bad, to drop out of school to help pay for the bills. How could Carter say no when most of the bills were her medical ones? Of course, after dropping out her sophomore year and getting a full time job and Denny's, Robert quit his job. Why bother working when his daughter made enough for the both of them?

Most of Carter's paycheck didn't even make it to the back, getting spent on the rent money, food, clothing, and her dad's beer mug. She managed to pay off a few bills and hoped that the insurance would take care of the rest. But honestly, Carter could care less about the debt her father had to pay. A year from now, she'd be gone and he'd be suffering the consequences. Not her.

Carter was brought out of her thinkings by Reid shaking her shoulder and was surprised to see the movie was over.

"You fell asleep," Reid explained, gently standing up from under her, going over to turn off the television set. He stretched and turned back to her, finding Carter laying on her back, staring at the ceiling. "What're you thinking about?"

She shrugged and sat up, an idea coming to her head. "You wanna play a game?" she inquired, patting the seat at her feet, pulling her legs in with a smile. Reid sat down, unsure.

"Yes?"

Carter clapped, actually _clapped_ in delight, like a little kid on Christmas morning. "Alright. Twenty Questions. I ask a question, you answer. You ask, I answer. You get twenty, I get twenty," she explained, though Reid already knew how to play. He nodded his head with a slight smile, surprised by her sudden enthusiasm.

"Kay. You can go first," he said, waving a hand at her as he leaned against the back of the couch lazily.

She sat quiet for a few minutes, thinking. "Okay," she said finally, jumping a little bit in her seat. "If you had to save you car or a cute little puppy which would you save?" Carter sat back, happy with her question. Random, yet helpful enough to give inside on the boy before her. If he saved his car, he wasn't worth her time. Saved the puppy, guy deserved a break.

Reid sat still for a minute, surprised by her question. Could you get anymore random? "I'd put the puppy in my car and then save the car," he said finally, giving Carter a triumphant grin.

Selfish yet caring. Odd combination, but it'd have to do. "You're turn," she said, mulling over his answer.

"Favorite color?"

Carter snorted. So much for creativity. "Orange."

Reid nodded and waited for his own question. "Who would play Reid Garwin in the _Life and Times of Reid Garwin_ movie?"

"Brad Pitt," he answered, not missing a beat and giving her a smirk. He went to go ask her a question when his phone started ringing, a cheesy tune coming from the expensive piece of technology. Carter stared at it in curiosity and looked at the clock which read 2:18 am. Who the hell was calling this late?

Reid swiped up his phone, not bothering to look at the caller ID. Who else other than Caleb would be calling him this late? "What, man?" he asked, turning away from a curious Carter as he listened to his friend's yelling. He hung his head with a sigh, pulling the phone away from his ear leaving it hanging at arms length, waiting for the yelling to quiet. "I'm with Carter," he said, bringing the phone back to his ear. "I didn't do it this time, seriously."

Carter was stunned when Reid put the phone in her face, gesturing for her to take it. She looked at him, unsure if he was serious.

"Caleb wants to talk to you," Reid said, waving the phone in her face with a slightly mad look.

She took the phone gingerly and put it to her ear, hearing music playing softly in the background. "Hello?"

"This is Carter, right?" a guy's voice on the other end asked her, which Carter found slightly stupid seeing Reid just told the boy her name.

"Erm. Yeah."

She heard the boy sigh and there was a pause before he spoke again. "Could you give Reid back the phone please?"

Carter didn't say anything and wordlessly handed him back the phone. Reid took it and said a few words to Caleb before closing the phone on him. He ran a hand through his hair tiredly and Carter looked awkwardly around the room. "Sorry about that," he said finally, standing up from the couch. Carter looked up at him and shook her head.

"No biggy," she told him truthfully. She gave him a soft smile, "We all have weird friends."

Reid laughed and pulled her up from the couch by the hands, leading her over to his dresser. "Mine are weirder," he said, taking out a shirt and pair of gym shorts out from the dresser, handing them to her, "Trust me."

Carter just shrugged her shoulders, walking to the bathroom with Reid's clothes in hand. "You've met Lola," she told him, turning around the close the door with a grin, "I think she might just beat your friends on the 'weirdness scale'." She closed the bathroom door and started pulling off her work clothes, hearing Reid laugh on the other side. She slipped into the too big sized clothes of Reid's and closed her eyes, opening the door back up with her spare hand that wasn't carrying her day clothes.

Walking back out into Reid's room, she covered her closed eyes with her hands. She was halfway to where she _thought_ was Tyler's bed when Reid spoke.

"What the hell are you doing, Cart?"

She opened her eyes and chuckled shyly, seeing him lying on his back on his bed with a smirk on his face. Not answering him, she climbed into Tyler's bed, pulling the covers up to her chin. Reid stared at her for a second before turning out the light. They lay in silence for a few minutes before Carter turned onto her side, letting out a deep sigh.

"Night Reid," she mumbled tiredly into Tyler's pillow, which she deftly noticed didn't smell nearly as good as Reid's did.

She was asleep before he had a chance to respond.

**Feed the addiction my little druggies, review.**


	6. The coffee's never strong enough

**Before I start, the chapter is dedicated to **alygdgrl** because of her random spurts of insanity and because hopefully now she won't have her little goons come after me and kill me in my sleep.**

**This is probably my last update for the week, school starts on Wednesday and I have to work tomorrow and clean the room. Plus, Mom's a nazi and is going to kill the net in about five minutes. Eeeeep. So, expect the next chapters to come out over the weekend. **

**Thanks to everyone who's been reviewing. Seriously, the power you get from being a drug dealer is rather nice. Upon the request of one of my readers, I toned down the cussing this time. Whoops for earlier chapters. I kinda go off on tangents and forget. Anyways, it's fixed.**

**For future reference: **Don't really have any.. wow. OH! I don't have a beta reader, so sorry for all the typos. Such as the boxers incident in chapter.. four. That was meant to be **boxes**. Heh heh. Whoops.

**Still owning nothing.**

**Chapter Six**

_My mother used to say that there are no strangers, only friends you haven't met yet. She's now in a maximum security twilight home in Australia._

"My god," Carter groaned, wincing at the obnoxiously loud ring of Reid's cell phone. She turned over, pillows pressed against each other her ears. It was the third time the person had called, and still Reid managed to be asleep. She had attempted to wake the boy, but gave up when he threw a very hard pillow at her face. Why he had a hard pillow in his room Carter had no idea, but she had no plans to be reunited with Mr. Pillow Punch anytime soon.

But, fifteen minutes later, listening to the annoying BEEP! BEEP! BEEEEP! BEEEEEEP! of Reid's phone, Carter could stand it no longer. There was only so much annoying music a girl could take that early in the morning. Sliding out of Tyler's bed, she stomped, loudly and intentionally, to Reid's desk and picked up his phone. She didn't bother even looking at the caller ID, probably her first mistake and simply flipped open the phone.

"Who the hell are you and why the hell are you calling at the freaking butt crack of dawn?" Carter demanded, falling onto Reid's bed, intentionally hitting him with her legs. He did nothing but groan and move away from her, pulling the covers closer to him. The big baby. Why couldn't he just answer his own god dang phone like a normal person?

Now, as Carter reflected upon the fact that she was answering a boy's phone with an unknown party on the other end, she probably wouldn't have answered the phone to begin with. She wasn't a bold person, but the incessant ringing was driving her insane. Could people not let her sleep in peace?

"Who is this?" a man's voice asked, more than likely trying to remember if he'd dialed the right number. Than again, if he knew Reid, it shouldn't surprise him when a girl answers his friend's phone.

Carter scowled. "I asked you first."

Yes, she was acting like a grumpy five year old, but the ass on the other end had woken her up out of one of the best nights worth of sleep she'd gotten in ages. She had every right to be angry. Sort of. Not really, but in her deranged sleepy mind, it made complete and utter sense.

The boy laughed at her, causing Carter's scowl to deepen. Now, he was mocking her. How pleasant. "I'm Pogue."

Ha. Funny name. She remembered Reid talking about Pogue the other night, apparently he was Caleb's other half. He meant it in the most serious of ways too. All four of them, Tyler included, were best friends, but paired off into even deeper friendships. It sounded a bit girly to Carter, but who was she to judge? She had like.. two friends. Reid and Lola. It wasn't like she had an overbearing amount of knowledge when it came to friendships.

The silence on the other end of the line brought Carter back to reality. "Carter."

"Oh," Pogue said with a small chuckle. "Diner girl."

He did seriously _not_ call her **Diner Girl**. "I resent that," she said, sitting up and away from the headboard of the still sleeping Reid's bed. "Just because I work in a diner does not in fact make me a diner girl. It simply means that I am a _girl_ working in a _diner_. I don't call you Idiot Boy just because you happen to be a boy that's an idiot, do I?"

"You're an odd girl," Pogue laughed and Carter frowned. She wasn't sure if it was meant as a complement or insult. "Could you tell Reid to call Kendal? She won't stop bugging the rest of us and Caleb's about to kill her." Subject change, much?

Who the hell was Kendal? "Yeah, sure," she answered, looking down at Reid, who had flipped onto his stomach and buried his head in his pillow, snoring softly. She had learned over the past two nights that although he snored, it wasn't an annoying snore like Lola's was. Lo's was like a foghorn that echoed. Definitely not the greatest thing to hear when you want nothing more than to sleep.

"Thanks," Pogue told her sincerely, going to hang up the phone. "Later, Diner Girl."

"Bye, Idiot Boy," Carter shot back, closing Reid's phone soon after.

She laughed softly, Pogue didn't seem all that terrible. A bit ass like, but then again, how else would he put up with Reid? She knew it was only a matter of time before the blond drove her insane, and Carter wouldn't be surprised in the least if his friends already were. That, or they had amazing abilities to ignore the stubborn boy, something she found hard to believe. You couldn't just _ignore_ Reid, he was one of those 'In your face, not going to leave anytime soon' type of guys. Rather hard to miss them.

Carter let out a yawn, letting herself lean back against the headboard of the bed, closing her eyes. She felt Reid move on his side of the bed as his arms shot out and pulled her under the covers quickly. He draped a heavy arm over her waste, her back against his chest.

"You're really loud," he mumbled as Carter squirmed for a moment, getting comfortable beneath the sheets. His arm tightened when she ceased movement and she could hear his breathing in her ear.

She shrugged and grinned when she felt him jump when her cold toes came in contact with his shins. "Pogue was bothering me," Carter explained, pulling the covers up to her nose and letting out a deep sigh. "Called me Diner Girl, needed to be taught a lesson in manners."

Reid frowned, though she couldn't see it. "Why were you talking to Pogue?"

"Your phone was annoying the crap out of me, so I answered the damn thing," she told him, closing her eyes again, "He told me to tell you to call Kendra. Or Kramer. I don't remember her name."

His chest shook Carter as he chuckled lightly. "Kendal?" he asked, guessing the name.

Carter just nodded her head, feeling the oncomings of sleep once again. Reid looked down at her when he got no reply and smirked at her peaceful face before letting his head drop back to the pillow. Sleep was good.

--

"Jeez, Cart," Reid said four hours later, looking at Carter and waving a hand in front of his nose, "You smell like a camel."

Carter gave him an affronted look, automatically raising an arm to smell herself. Pretty smelling vanilla deodorant, honestly, what was wrong with that? So what if she hadn't showered in two days. It wasn't as if she'd been given a chance to go home and get a shower. "Not my fault you kidnapped me and refused to let me shower!" she told him, putting a hand on her hip and glowering at him.

Reid walked into the bathroom, coming back with a towel in hand. "I did not kidnap you," he said, throwing the blue colored towel towards Carter's head. She glared at him, catching it. "It's only kidnapping if the person doesn't come willingly," he smirked, jumping back onto his bed. "And last time I checked, you didn't need much convincing to come stay in my room." He turned on the television using the remote and waved a hand of dismissal to her. "Girl's showers are the last door on the left."

Carter stared at him for a minute before taking the towel and walking out of his room, making sure to slam the door behind her. "'Oh, you smell like a camel, Cart!'" she mimicked cheekily, walking down the empty hallway with a sway. "'You didn't have to stay with little ol' me in the my rich little dorm'," Carter sneered, not watching as she walked past the door that had 'WOMEN'S SHOWERS' painted on the front. "It's not like he did an illegal U-Turn and forced me back to watch a bunch of Brad Pitt movies!"

She continued walking down the hall and turned the corner, stopping when she came to the head of a pair of stairs. Carter quickly turned around and backtracked her steps, looking for the bathroom. After what seemed like hours of trying to find the bathroom, Carter sat down in the middle of the hallway, towel resting in her lap.

"I'm screwed."

A laugh from behind her made Carter look up and wince. It wasn't fair that she'd be cornered in an empty hallway in a creepy school that had ghosts running around it. Honestly, the Fates were not in a kind mood towards Carter today. Did she mention that the hallway was _empty_? No bunches of guys surrounding her willing to defend her honor this time. Just her and the prick of the year, Aaron. Ohhhh goody.

"You lost?" Aaron asked, walking towards her with a smirk that reminded Carter of Joker from Batman. That creepy look that instantly sent chills down your spine and you felt like Bambi about to get eaten by a wolf. Very unpleasant feeling.

Carter swallowed slowly and climbed to her feet. "No," she said hesitantly, backing up when the taller boy took a step forward. "Just admiring the nice.. uh, floor job." The excuse made even Carter wince at it's oddness.

Sure, not one of the better lies Carter had told or the most convincing, but she was bad at spur of the moment comebacks. Put her in debate team, where she had time to prepare a fight against the opposer and she'd kick everyone's debating asses. But put her in the spotlight and a microphone in front of a brick wall, Carter had to start ducking rotten tomatoes.

The other night at the party had been completely not her. Normally, she was all for letting other people defend her. Carter was used to people making fun of her, walking all over her as Lola had said. Being the nerd of her class, having an older brother in jail since he was fifteen, and an alcoholic for a father made her an easy target. Though, that night at the party, Carter felt more confident for some reason. She would've never said those things to Aaron if it had been any other time.

Like, now for instance.

Aaron laughed and shook his head, looking down at the floor. "Really? I never noticed how interesting our floors were."

"Very interesting," Carter said with a shrug, taking a few move steps backwards. "It's been very nice chatting with you," she laughed a bit nervously as Aaron kept walking towards her. "But, I really must be going. You know, places to go, people to see.."

She was almost shocked when Aaron stopped following her. "I'm in room 311," he told her with a suggestive wink, "Call me if you need anything."'

Carter let out a relieved sigh as Aaron gave her a last smile and walked down the hall away from her. She sat back onto the floor and traced the tiles. It_ was_ a pretty nifty floor.

--

Ten minutes later, Carter finally found her way back to the showers. She debated whether or not she should actually go in. This was Spenser, a prestige boarding school that she _did not_ attend. More than likely inside the bathroom would be a gathering of bozo blonds who _did_ attend Spenser. Despite being blond and stupid, they somehow got into Spenser, meaning they were smart and would probably instantly know that Carter wasn't one of them.

That and the fact that she was wearing Reid's clothes might give her away.

But, running a hand through her tangled brown locks, Carter knew how badly she needed a shower. She hadn't looked in a mirror for very long in a few days, but figured that she probably didn't look all that great. How Reid had been putting up with her for the past couple of days was beyond her.

With a sigh, Carter pushed open the bathroom door and cringed, awaiting the blow to her ego that she knew was coming.

Seconds passed in silence and no comments came her way. Playing it safe, Carter kept her eyes closed for a few more seconds, listening closely for the sounds of running water or a blow dyer, but heard none. Opening her eyes, she let out a sigh of relief as she looked around. The bathroom was completely empty.

Thank god.

--

It took Carter almost half an hour to find her way back to Reid's room after she finished with her steaming hot shower in the empty bathroom. Somehow, none of the Spenser dimwits walked in gossiping while Carter had been there, but as she walked down the hall back towards Reid's room, she passed by a group of girls that were heading to the bathroom, talking about what color lip gloss was better. Cherry Red or Strawberry Blossom Pink.

Personally, Carter would go with a mint chap stick, but none of the blonds had asked for her opinion. Shame.

Carter opened up the door to Reid's room with a smile, toweling off her hair as she did. "Which is better, Cherry Red or Strawberry Pink?" She asked, turning around and stopped short, the smile falling from her face slowly.

Reid pushed the tall blond girl, that he had been previously been kissing, of off him quickly, looking at the still Carter in surprise. She looked at him, the girl that was on top of him on his bed, and back to Reid. She felt her face turning red and let an uncomfortable smile come on to her face.

_Awkward_.

The blond stared at Carter in somewhat confusion, probably wondering what the hell she was doing in her boyfriend's room, talking about lip gloss of all things. She looked down to where Reid was still staring at Carter and starting to get off the bed, buttoning up the top two buttons of her shirt. "I should probably be going," she said softly, leaning over to pick up her purse from the ground.

"It's fine," Carter said, walking into the room and picking up her clothes from the night before and giving the girl a tentative smile. "I gotta get going anyways. You're Kendal, right?" It was a lucky guess that she was hoping wasn't wrong, otherwise more tension would be on its way fairly quickly.

The blond girl nodded her head, seemingly surprised and a bit happy that Carter knew her name. Reid watched as Carter picked up her shoes and headed for the door. He jumped off the bed, giving Kendal a finger that told her to wait, following after Carter into the hall. He heard Kendal sigh and closed the door behind him, jogging lightly down the hall after the other girl.

"We okay?" he called to her, concerned about what she was thinking at the moment. Reid hadn't meant for it to happen, Kendal showing up and all. They'd broken up over three weeks ago, but she didn't seem to believe him when he told her it was over. Not that he had helped the situation any by making out with her every chance he had. It was the way he was, Reid couldn't really do anything about it when Kendal didn't have a problem with it.

Carter sighed and turned around, trying to give him a smile that came out more like a grimace. "Yeah, we're fine Reid. I just gotta get to work. Some of us gotta work for a living," she said, not meaning for it to come out the way it did.

"Thought it was your day off?" Reid shot to her, a bit quirked by her shot at the fact that he didn't have to work. He knew she wasn't fine, but also knew that she wasn't about to admit it to him.

She shrugged, running a tired hand through her hair. "I could use the extra hours."

Reid scowled as she turned back around and started towards the stairs. "You sure we're fine?" he told her, knowing that she would lie to him again.

"Right as rain, darling," she called back to him, not looking back as she put an arm into the air and waved to him, disappearing down the stairs.

--

Lola watched as Carter came in through the back door, punching in her time card dully and hanging her plaid bag up on the peg with a sigh. She pulled up her hair with a rubber band, coming to stand next to Lola, a vacant look in her brown eyes.

"What the hell did that boy do to you?" Lola demanded, sitting her friend down on an empty plastic milk crate, standing before her, hands on hips.

If that Reid boy did something to hurt Carter, Lola was going to personally go down to the high class richie rich school he went to and kick his scrawny little butt. She did not give in to his 'manly wiles' and give him Carter's number just to sit back and watch him hurt her. Oh, no. That hadn't been part of the deal they set.

Carter just shrugged and looked down at her feet, not answering. Lola set out a sigh and crouched down in front of her, cupping the younger girl's chin and forcing her to look at her. "Do I need to go down and give Garwin the ol' one two for you? Cause I will!"

The seriousness of Lola's face made Carter smile and she shook her head, pulling away her chin. "Nah," she told her, smile fading slowly. "He's just being a guy."

Lola looked at her oddly, waiting for more and giving her a proceeding look when she didn't. "Gotta give me more than that, Murph."

"He's got a girlfriend," she said, looking away again. It was the second time that day that Carter had found floor's enthralling.

"Okay," Lola said slowly, still not completely understand. "I'm going to guess this is a bad thing? Is the girl a complete ape? Monkey face? Possibly have duck feet?"

Carter gave her a look that told her she was partially insane and shook her head. "No, she's not an ape. Sorry to disappoint."

"Eh. One can only hope," Lola retorted nonchalantly. "So, what's wrong with Bad-Ass' girl?"

"Nothing," Carter said honestly, "She seems great. Tall, blond, blue eyes, model Nazi. Hitler would love her."

The last part came out sourly, instantly telling Lola that the girlfriend was in fact _not_ great. She stayed silent, waiting for Carter to continue.

"I just wish he would've told me," she stated finally, hanging her head slightly. "I mean, we're friends right? Don't friends tell each other stuff like that?"

"Maybe he didn't know how to tell you," Lola suggested, trying to find an easy way to describe Reid's complete idiocy. "You are rather unapproachable at times, you know. That hole beach bum exterior thing makes you rather menacing to the naked eye," she continued seriously, ducking when Carter swatted a hand at her head. She laughed and stood up, pulling the girl up with her and patted her gently on the shoulder. "Have no fear, Murph. The ass'll come around eventually."

Carter shrugged and walked back to pull her apron out of her bag. "I guess so."

"Trust me," Lola said, strutting over to her and dramatically slinging an arm over her shoulder. "You're too irresistible for him to stay away for too long."

**Feed the addiction.. review.**


	7. I know you think it's more

**I lied. I hacked onto the computer and finished the chapter and currently are dodging bullets from my mom to post this. Hope everyone loves it, I'll try to write more tonight and post tomorrow after school. No promises. Sorry to be a crappy dealer. Please don't pay anyone to come and kill me. Later duckies.**

**For future reference:**Movie in about four chapters. Whoo for hot guys. Tyler and Lola will not become anything more than friends. Doesn't have green eyes. **La, La, Lie **by Jack's Mannequin inspired this chapter somewhat. You can go listen to it while you read if that'll help float your boat. I have myspace and msn if anyone feels the need to know me. Just send a message saying 'hey I'm from fanfic' or something along the lines so I don't call the cops on you.

**I own nothing. Except my drugs that I like to give to small children.**

**Chapter Seven**

_To fear love is to fear life, and those who fear love are already three parts dead._

Carter stared up at her house with unease. She'd worked for a few hours before Stan had kicked her out, telling her that she needed to go home. Someone had leaked to him that she'd been avoiding her Crack House for the past couple of days, and unknowing of her father's actions, wanted her to go and make amends with him. Like her father would want to make amends with her after Carter had left in the middle of the night, locking him out of his own house, and disappearing for three days in a row.

Oh, yeah. That'll go over well with him.

Taking a deep breath, Carter walked up the creaking front steps slowly, taking her time. Her car was still parked in the front lawn, or what was left of the lawn, seemingly untouched. She was relieved to see it in one piece, the last time she'd snuck out her dad had stolen her engine chain. Needless to say, Carter didn't drive anywhere for a few weeks while Lola's boyfriend at the time fixed up her Mustang.

Pausing with her hand on the doorknob, she took another deep breath and pushed the door open with difficulty, having the lift it up on it's hinges to open it. Carter stepped cautiously into the house, closing the door behind her and hanging her bag on the hook next to the closet. She wrung her hands nervously, walking down the front hall and looked in the den when she didn't see her dad at the kitchen table.

"Dad?" she called out, not taking off her shoes as she walked down the hall slowly.

The television screen reflected in her father's glasses as he watched it, the sound turned off. He didn't acknowledge her as he continued watching the taped gold game from back in the eighties. One of his favorite things to do, watch the same game over and over until he could say the commentary by heart and then he'd move onto the next game. Carter didn't know how he did it, being drunk almost every time he did it, and still able to recite the entire game.

"You came back," Robert said in a low voice, and she was surprised to find that he wasn't drunk.

Whether that was a good thing or not, she didn't know.

"I was at Lola's," Carter said, walking further into the room, sitting on the edge of the stuffed rocking chair. It wasn't a complete lie, she'd gone by Lola's after work to borrow a pair of her clothes. She'd been wearing the same clothes for three days and knew her dad would blow a gasket if she came home in Reid's clothes. She didn't want any more trouble than she was already bound to get.

Robert nodded his balding head, still not meeting his daughter's eyes. "Jim called," he said, breaking the tense silence that had fallen between them. "Said they're going to let him out on good behavior a month early. He should be back by Thanksgiving."

Carter stared at her father in complete shock. "He's coming home?" she asked, mouth flopping in the air like a fish. "As in, to stay?"

Her dad just nodded his head again and turned back to his golf game, completely ignoring her. She didn't mind though as Carter stood up and walked out of the room.

Jimmy was coming home. The thought of seeing her brother, for the first time without a glass wall between them in almost four years stunned her. Last she had heard, Jimmy still had a year left in the State Jail, he would be lucky to be home by the time Carter's own time was up. He'd been in jail since she'd been diagnosed, never being able to visit her after her surgery's or radiation treatments. He'd always been three hundred miles away inside of a barred room with a sticky cell mate name 'Fisher Bob'.

But now, he was coming home. To stay.

Carter let out a shout of excitement, running up the broken and creaky stairs to her room two and a time. With a face splitting grin, she flew onto her bed, grabbing her pillow and holding it to her.

Jimmy was coming home. Which meant that he could get a job and help pay for the food and rent. She could actually go and get her GED like she'd been planning. Hell, Carter could even re-enroll in classes and be an actual normal high schooler! She'd quit Denny's, or at least fall back to part time so that she could focus on school work and she'd finally have her diploma up next to her mom's above the fireplace.

She knew that getting so excited about Jimmy coming home was probably a bad idea. This was around the fourth or fifth time he'd said he was, and every time had turned out to be a fluke. Making plans to go back to school and quitting Denny's was probably taking things a bit too far, but Carter couldn't help herself. Things were actually starting to look up.

They could be a _real_ family again.

A giggle of excitement escaped Carter's lips as she thought of how things would change once her older brother came home. They would be an actual family again. With a grin, she pulled out the crumpled Denny's order ticket and smoothed it out. Using a pen from her other pocket, Carter crossed out the fifth filled out number.

See Jimmy again, check.

One down, nine to go. She still needed to fill out about half of the slots, but some were better than none.

--

Lola had been wrong when she had said that everything would be fine between Carter and Reid. It had been almost a week and still neither had talked to each other. Granted, Reid had made efforts to talk with her, but for some reason Carter always ignored his calls or hid in the back when he came by the diner looking for her.

She felt like a five year old having an argument with her best friend over a coloring crayon, but a teeny tiny bit of Carter felt betrayed. Sure, she had only known Reid for a few days, but she still felt like he should have told her that he had a girlfriend before she spent two nights in his dorm. No, they didn't do anything that should make her feel guilty for staying with him, but Carter could help but wonder what Kendal thought of her.

Surely, by then Reid had told her about Carter. It wasn't like there was something for either of them to feel guilty about, they'd done nothing other than watch a few movies together and go to a party. But still, depending on what type of girl Kendal was, that could be considered very bad for Reid. She wasn't sure that the girlfriend would take well to learning a girl had been having 'sleep overs' with her boyfriend.

Lola had tried to get Carter to call Reid back, but the girl had been adamant, refusing to talk to him. She felt bad for Reid, he didn't deserve being treated the way he was but knew that Carter would eventually come around and things would be back to normal for them. Even so, she could tell that the separation between the two wasn't going to help them in any way. All it was doing was hurting them both.

Not that either stubborn teen would be the first to admit it. They were more alike than either knew, and Lola knew that there was nothing she could do to make Carter talk to him. Not that that stopped her from trying on a daily basis.

"Call him."

Carter shook her head for the millionth time, wiping down a clean table unintentionally as she tried to ignore her friend's badgering. "No."

Lola scowled and leaned against the table she was cleaning, shoving her face in front of Carter's. "Call him. Or I will," she threatened, completely serious. She was tired of both Reid and Carter's stupidity and was ready to throttle them both if they didn't start talking soon. Mostly Carter though, at least Reid was making efforts to make right with her.

"Go ahead," Carter said with a casual shrug of her shoulders, moving away and on to the next table that needed cleaning. "I'm sure he'd love to talk with you."

"You're an annoying little girl," Lola scolded her, even pointing a finger at her as Carter continued to ignore her. "Stubborn too."

"All part of my charm," she answered in a sing song voice, giving her friend a smile before vanishing into the back just as a Silver Jetta pulled into the parking lot.

With an aggravated yell, Lola threw her hands up into the air and walked out the diner, pushing open the front door forcefully. She stomped over to where Reid was getting out of his car, laughing at something a tall brown haired boy had said. He looked at Lola in surprise when she stopped in front of him, an angry look on her face.

"Hey, Lo," he greeted, dropping his car keys into his pocket and shutting his car door. "Something wrong?"

Lola said nothing and clamped her hand onto the blond boy's wrist, spinning around and pulling him along towards the Denny's front door. Reid followed behind, confused while the other boy laughed softly and jogged after them. "You are going to stop being an ass and talk to that girl," Lola stated, pushing Reid through the open door and showing him in with a hand. "You both are acting like five year olds and I'm about to murder Murph." She waved a hand at him, motioning him towards the swinging doors that led into the back. "Fix it before I kill my best friend!"

Reid laughed and stopped at the counter barrier, looking at the red head with a small apologetic face. "I'd love to fix things, Lo," he told her, absent absentmindedly running a hand through his hair. "But I can't do anything about it if Carter won't even talk to me."

"Fix it," Lola said in a low voice that clearly told Reid to get moving or else he'd be the one getting killed, not Carter.

"Alright, jeez woman," Reid yelled, throwing his arms up into the air as he lifted up the barrier and disappeared into the back, the swinging doors swallowing his frame. Lola let out a soft cry of triumph and pumped in arm in the air before falling onto one of the bar stools.

Tyler sat down next to where Lola had crashed onto the counter with a chuckle. "Carter as annoying as Reid is?" he asked, ordering a coffee from the girl behind the counter.

"God, I hated high school," Lola groaned looking at the boy with a look of annoyance. "Too much bloody drama."

"Amen to that," Tyler agreed, toasting his fresh cup of coffee grinning lightly.

--

Picking up the three black plastic bags full of garbage, Carter started towards the back door, kicking it opening with a foot. Dragging the smelly bags to the dumpster, she threw open the heavy lid and tossed in the bags with grimace. How could people make that much garbage in on a matter of hours? It was disgusting, to say the least.

She turned around, shaking the trash juice that had leaked onto her hands in the air in attempts to rid herself of the germs and stopped when she saw Reid leaning against the back door's frame.

"What are you doing here?" Carter asked, surprised to find him in the back of the Denny's building. How had he even gotten past Stan and into the back?

He pushed himself off the door frame, completely blocking her way back into the diner. "Lola threatened to kill us both with a spork if I didn't talk to you," Reid explained, adding in the spork part just to see her reaction.

"She would do that," Carter said with a small smile, knowing that on more than one occasion Lola had threatened someone with that exact threat. They had just looked at her like she was insane before walking away, but it had been one of the funniest things Carter had ever had the liberty of being able to watch.

They stood in silence, staring at everything other than each other when Reid suddenly broke through the tension. "Why do I feel like we broke up?," he said, almost wincing at how pansy-ass he sounded.

Carter looked at him oddly and shook her head slowly. "You can't break up if you've never been together, Reid. And last I checked, you had a girlfriend, Kramer!"

"Kendal."

"Same thing!"

What did he mean, broke up? They'd never been together! They were friends, and Carter planned on keeping them_ just friends_. She was perfectly fine with the way their relationship, or lack of, was going. She didn't need a boyfriend right now, or anytime in the near future. She had thought that Reid had known that, not that Reid had probably wanted to date her in the first place.

Actually, Carter didn't even have a clue _why_ Reid was friends with her. It wasn't like they went to school together or had mutual friends between them. He had just randomly decided one day that he was going to barge into her life and make himself at home. If anything, all this was Reid's fault, not hers. He was the one who decided they were friends and the one that didn't tell her about Kendal. Carter had simply been the girl that he brought along for the ride.

Lucky her.

Reid shook his head, taking a step forward and leaving the door behind to shut itself. "I didn't mean it like we were dating. I just meant that you said we were fine, and we're not. And I don't like it," he paused and looked at her almost sadly. "You said that we were fine."

"We are fine!" Carter yelled at him, about ready to start pounding in the boys thick head. Jesus, men were stupid.

"How many times are you gonna say that before you actually mean it?" Reid asked, frowning.

The thought of knocking her head against the brick wall across the alley from her was starting to sound heavenly. "I _do_ mean it! How many times do I need to say it before it sinks in to your thick head?"

"If every thing's fine, why the hell do you keep avoiding me?" Reid demanded, starting to lose part of his cool exterior as Carter became more stubborn. "You don't answer my calls, you hide like a four year old when I come here, you won't even _talk _to me! How the hell is everything fine?"

It sounded much worse when he said it. "I've been busy," she mumbled, focusing intently on to the brick wall behind Reid's head.

"Too busy to pick up the damn phone when it rings?"

Carter rubbed her eyes wearily, still not making eye contact with Reid. "Stan's been sick. Everyone's been picking up extra hours to pick up the slack. Ask Lola, we've been slammed the past couple of days."

"Lola still manages to answer the phone," Reid retorted quickly. He sighed and leaned back against the building's wall. "I said I'm sorry. What else do you want me to do, Cart?" He spread his arms out around him, trying to figure out what the girl across the alley wanted from him.

Carter didn't speak right away, standing in thought. She knew that acting like a five year old wasn't going to solve anything. She wasn't even sure why she was mad at Reid, but after a week of ignoring him, it was beginning to become a bit tiring. He didn't deserve her anger, for whatever reason, all he'd done was keep the details of his personal life personal. How could she be mad at him for that.

"I'm sorry," Carter mumbled, scuffing a rugged converse on the ground, looking anywhere other than the surprised looking Reid. He looked at her and shook his blond head, a smirk coming over his face.

"Knew you couldn't resist me," he said, sauntering over to her and slinging an arm over her shoulder while she laughed.

"Way to kill a moment, Garwin."

Reid sighed and steered them both towards the closed door that led into the back of Denny's. He stopped just before the door, blocking Carter's entrance and looked down at her. She gave him a confused look, leaning against the door, waiting for him to explain.

"I have this idea that I want to run by you," Reid said carefully as Carter eyed him cautiously. "What are you doing this weekend?"

Carter thought about it, coming up with nothing. Lola had forced her to take the weekend off on Monday, saying that she could use the few days off. She looked up to see Reid trying to without a smirk. "Oh no," she groaned, instantly knowing that whatever the two had planned together couldn't be good. "Please don't kill me."

Reid snorted at her assumption and shook his head. "I was going to bring you to Boston this weekend," Carter's head flew up but he ignored her, continuing on with his talking. "But now that I think about it, killing you would save me not only time but money too! God, Carter, you are a genius!"

Carter didn't say anything towards his comment and shot away from Reid, throwing her arms up as she danced around the alley. "I'm going to Boston! I'm going to Boston!" she sang with skipping around like a little girl on Christmas morning while Reid watched on in amusement. She danced over to him, throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly. "Thank you thank you thank you!"

"This mean you're going with me?" Reid asked smirking when she hit him on the shoulder with a face splitting grin.

"Smart ass."

**Feed the addiction, review junkies.**


	8. Than just bad luck

**Holy Jesus monkeys, so sorry for the delay in updates. This is officially the shortest chapter I've written in history. Please don't hurt me. The next one will be hugely long, so have no fear. I actually have a nice long note for you guys at the end, so just go ahead and read my painfully short chapter.**

**For future reference:** There's a new story in the works, a Transformers one, that should be coming hopefully next week. I keep seeing SC ideas everywhere now (plot bunnies have ruined all my favorite movies), the next chapters are going to be pretty great. I've always wanted a little sister.

**I now own a new song called Just Impolite. It's by Plushgun, and it's oh so amazing. Seriously, go and get it. Dan isn't signed, so move your piggy butts to myspace. **

**Still owning nothing.**

**Chapter Eight**

"_Rita really likes those big nuts, doesn't she?"_

"_Hell yes she does. She totally rose my English grade when I roasted them too!"_

_-Me and Shane, at work. Holy bananas, I really like that guy_

"I'm not going," Carter announced, almost stomping her foot childishly on the ground as she observed her torn apart room.

Clothes were strewn everywhere, covering not only the floor but her bed and small desk. Carter wasn't even sure where anything was anymore, the clothes had over taken every inch of her room. Somewhere in the mess CAT was probably mewing, trying to free herself from the avalanche that Lola had constructed. If only she had listened when Carter had warned her against trying to open her closet door, which happened to be stuffed to the brim and a hazard to their safety.

But noooooo.

Lola just _had_ to open the closet door and let both of the girls be attacked by the flying clothes that had been lurking in the closet, waiting for a stupid red head to let them loose. Carter had a sneaking suspicion that red was _not_ her best friend's natural hair color. It would be against all of science and many very smart men would cry if that weren't the case.

"You are too going," Lola said absentmindedly, not really paying attention to the younger girl's moaning as she searched through the piles of clothes. Picking up a yellow shirt with black stripes across the front, she draped it over her arm and continued to wade through the clothes. "You already agreed to go, plus," she looked at her friend with a pointed look, "you know you wanna go."

It was true, going to Boston was a dream come true. Going with Reid was just a plus for Carter. He had everything planned out, not that he was sharing anything about the details with her, trying to make it into a surprise. But it meant that Carter still needed a cover story to feed her dad, who had no idea that his daughter was going to Boston with a boy and would be sharing a hotel with said boy overnight.

Even though he was a drunk and not the best father in the world, Robert despised any guy who made moves on his youngest child.

Carter found this out the rather hard way at her first school dance in seventh grade. Jonathon, a fairly nice boy with _amazing_ brown eyes had stopped by, with flowers, to pick her up at her house, his mom waiting in the car outside. He didn't have a chance to step inside the house before Robert had shoved his old criminal record in the boy's face saying '_See this? You hurt my baby and I have no trouble going back.'_ Jonathon had been out of there like a bat out of hell, his mother not even fully waiting for him to be in the car before she had started driving off.

Of course, if Jonathon had taken time to actually _read_ the record, he would see that only one felony was printed on the paper. At the age of ten, Robert had stolen a puppy from the pet shop. No mass murders, armed robberies, grand theft auto. Just a little kid who stole a puppy cause it licked his hand.

Oh yes, Carter's dad was _such_ a hardened criminal.

Carter gave Lola a deadpan which she chose to ignore. "No duh, I want to go. It's _Boston_, Lo, _BOSTON_! The one place I've been dreaming about going to for years! Hell, my entire life!"

Boston, the land of cream pie and Babe Ruth. No place was better than Boston, Carter was convinced. Not that she'd been an avid traveler her entire life or anything. In fact, this would only be the third or fourth time she'd been out of town for something other than her cancer treatments.

"Then go," Lola said, stopping her search for clothing to give Carter a soft smile. "God knows you deserve a break. You've been working at Denny's forever, time for a break." Her smile turned a tint evil and she went back to clothes searching. "If you ask me, Garwin's the best guy to go to for a good time. Now that's a boy who knows how to have fun."

Even though Lola knew that Carter wasn't fully aware of the boy's not-so-good reputation with women, she knew all about it. One girl after the other, king of the one night stand, have 'em and drop 'em, that sort of thing. But, Lola also knew about the deal between herself and the gorgeous blond. She gave him the means and way to get to know Carter, a simple phone number, on the condition that he never let them become romantically involved in _any_ way. There was no way Lola was going to let her best friend get her little heart broken by a player.

Of course, Carter didn't know that she had Reid made a deal. She didn't need to know, and as long as Reid didn't turn into a horn dog, nothing would go wrong. Carter would get time to actually _live_, and Reid had a chance to hang out with an amazing girl. A flawless plan.

"My dad's going to flip when he finds out," Carter groaned, throwing herself onto the clothes covered bed, jumping up when a claw came lashing out from under her.

Lola shook her head as Carter freed CAT from the clothes and kept searching for appropriate clothing for the Boston trip. It had taken a total of five seconds for Lola to designate herself Carter's packer as she had watched the girl try to choose between blue cargo shorts or yellow cargo shorts. "He can't get mad if he doesn't know."

"He_ always_ knows when I do something I'm not supposed to!" Carter defended, throwing a pillow into the air and catching it. "Even if he's drunk! He still knows! He's got spies all over the place! I'm not even gonna be able to get outside of city limits before he comes tearing after us."

She was starting to hyperventilate. She couldn't go with Reid to _Boston_! Her dad would track her down with hounds from hell and drag her home by her ankles! Possibly even her toes! He was a maniac, the one and only true maniac that Carter had th e displeasure of knowing. He would kill her. The thoughts of being fed to a lobster came swimming back.

Oh, hell.

She was dead. No questions about it.

"Bloody hell, you're annoying," Lola said with an aggravated sigh, taking the clothes she'd chosen and threw them carelessly into an old messenger bag that was going to be Carter's suitcase.

"You can't say that," Carter stated, snapping out of her 'freaking-out' moment.

Lola frowned and ceased her packing, turning to Carter with her hands on hips. "And why the _bloody hell_ not?"

Carter gave her an odd look, standing up on her bed and throwing a pillow at Lola's head. "You aren't even British! You're from Oregon!" She had little time to say anything else as she fell onto the bed, pillow flying over her head dangerously close to impacting with her face.

Note to self: Oregonians get mad when you say they're from Oregon.

"Where's the law that says an American can't use British slang?" Lola yelled a smile on her face as she jumped onto the bed, picking up a nearby pillow and beating her friend over the head with it. Carter laughed and moved to try and get away from the taller and older girl, having little success.

It took a few minutes of trying, but finally Carter got a pillow of her own and smack Lola over the head with it. Lola screamed and bounced across the bed, tackling Carter and continued beating her over the head rather brutally. Neither girl heard the doorbell ring down the stairs from them as they proceeded with their all out pillow war.

CAT watched on lazily from her place in the paint deprived window sill as Carter fell from the bed with a shocked look. Lola stood on her knees on the edge of the bed, laughing almost maniacally at the fallen girl and let out a scream when Carter swung her leg up and pulled her down next to her.

"You're _so _dead you little git!" Lola screamed, chasing after a giggling Carter as she wielded a pillow. She skipped down the hall and dashed down the stairs, looking back to see Lola following close behind. Carter turned back forward and ran into something hard. She bounced back and nearly fell, a pair of hands grabbing her by the arms and held her steady while her head swam.

"Ow."

Lola came to a stop and leaned against the wall, brushing a piece of hair out of her slightly red face with a grin. "Hey, Garwin."

"Hey Lo," Reid said, releasing his hold on Carter as she regained her balance quickly.

He was dressed in his normal attire, lost dark green shirt, jeans, black skate shoes, and fingerless gloves were all in check. Lola had to admit, if he weren't a high school kid and wasn't such a player, she'd definitely be another girl that would fall for him. But, alas, he was too young, too horny, and too good of a friend of Carter's to even think of doing anything with him.

"You ready to hit the road, Cart?" he asked, turning to look down at the shorter of the two girls. "I managed to steal the Hummer from Tyler," Reid announced, waving the car keys in front of Carter's happy face.

"Sweet!" she yelled, throwing her arms into the air and spinning around once. Carter blushed at both her friend's amused looks and pointed towards the stairs. "I just gotta go get my stuff," she muttered embarrassed and started to the stairs, bringing a grinning Lola with her.

They climbed up the stairs quickly, Lola ushering her up with a smack on the butt and both could hear Reid's laughter as Carter let out a squeal. "That's for saying I was from Oregon!"

--

**Okay, so yes, shortest and most crappy chapters ever, I know. BUT, because I love my reviewers so very much, I have a deal for you. If you review, which I hope you do.., you may ask me ANYTHING about Speeding Cars and I will answer as truthfully as possible. This means, anything at all. Even if it will inquire spoilers, I'll tell you the truth. Or.. as close to the truth as I have planned out right now. Of course, if you don't want to know anything before it happens.. just review.**

**So sorry for the delay in updating too. The past two weeks have been a bit hell-full. Stalking exboyfriends that cry, been puking my guts out the past two days, and my family's planning a trip to Hawaii in the next couple of weeks. Plus, it's end of semester so I have a shitload of homework to make up that I refused to do when it got assigned. Whoops.**

**BUT, I promise that I'll be updating again next weekend, with the actual road trip. Probably going to be the longest chapter so far, not to mention the rest of 20 questions. If any of you have questions that you think Reid and Carter should ask each other, go ahead and leave them in the review. I have some already planned out, but hey, more the merrier. **

**Alrighty, I'm done ranting in attempts to make the chapter look longer. Sorry again for the shortness of it. Promise that none of the others will be remotely this short ever again. Ergh, bad Fin bad, I know.**

**Reviews are like heroine. Don't kill the dealer just 'cause she keeps the goods to herself.**


	9. it's over

Hey guys;

I feel quite horrible doing this to all of you, but I'm finally giving up on Speeding Cars. I'm at the point in the story where I know what I need to happen, but unsure of how to get there. I blame it on my lack of planning skills, the whole trip to Boston wasn't supposed to happen until the last few chapters, but I jumped ahead and got myself into a pickle. I was actually really quite excited about this story and everything I had planned for it, let me say now that the ending was going to be heartbreaking. However, I hate leaving everyone with false hopes that I'll one day update, when I know for a fact that I won't. So, thank you all so very much for you support thus far and I'm sorry to disappoint you all. Though, if it makes a difference to you, I have another story in the works with help from my friend Madi. It's **completely** different than this while still centered around Reid, and I'm pretty excited to get working on it. Be on the lookout for it, should be up and running in the next few days before we both leave for a vacation. :) Once again, thanks so much for you support!

Rory.


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